The  RALPH  D.  REED  LIBRARY 

•o 

DEPARTMENT  OF  GEOLOGY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES,  CALIF. 


This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last          This  faook  is  DUE  on  the  ,ast 
I     NOV    2  &4   I&  ^ate  stamPed  b 


ANIMALS   OF  THE  PAST 


Phororhacos,  a  Patagonian  Giant  of  the  Miocene. 
From  a  drawing  by  Charles  R.  Knight. 


Science  for  Everybody 


ANIMALS  OF  THE  PAST 

BY 

FREDERIC  A.    LUCAS 

Curator  of  the  Division  of  Comparative  Anatomy, 
United  States    National  Museum 

r 


24/3* 

FULLY  ILLUSTRATED 


NEW  YORK 
McCLURE,   PHILLIPS  &   CO. 

1902 


COPYBIGBT,  1900,  BT  8.  8.  MCCLTTRB  Co. 

1901.    BT    McCwiBE.    PHILLIPS    &    Co. 


FIB8T  IMFB*88IO»,  NOVKMBEB,  1901 
SKOOMD  IMPBXMIOK.  MABCH,  1902 


Library 


U-  3^ 
Z 

TABLE   OF   CONTENTS 

INTRODUCTORY  AND  EXPLANATORY 

Use  of  scientific  names,  xvi ;  estimates  of  age  of  earth,  xvii ; 
restorations  by  Mr.  Knight,  xviii ;  Works  of  Reference,  xix. 

I.  FOSSILS,  AND  HOW  THEY  ARE  FORMED 

Definition  of  fossils,  1 ;  fossils  may  be  indications  of  animals  or 
plants,  2 ;  casts  and  impressions,  3 ;  why  fossils  are  not  more 
abundant,  4;  conditions  under  which  fossils  are  formed,  5; 
enemies  of  bones,  6;  Dinosaurs  engulfed  in  quicksand,  8; 
formation  of  fossils,  9;  petrified  bodies  frauds,  10;  natural 
casts,  10;  leaves,  13;  incrustations,  14;  destruction  of  fossils, 
15;  references,  17. 

II.  THE  EARLIEST  KNOWN  VERTEBRATES 

Methods  of  interrogating  Nature,  18 ;  thickness  of  sedimen- 
tary rocks,  20 ;  earliest  traces  of  life,  21  ;  early  vertebrates 
difficult  of  preservation,  22 ;  armored  fishes,  23  ;  abundance 
of  early  fishes,  25  ;  destruction  of  fish,  26  ;  carboniferous 
sharks,  29 ;  known  mostly  from  teeth  and  spines,  30 ;  refer- 
ences, 32. 

III.  IMPRESSIONS  OF  THE  PAST 

Records  of  extinct  animals,  33  ;  earliest  traces  of  animal  life, 
34 ;  formation  of  tracks,  35  ;  tracks  in  all  strata,  36  ;  discov- 
ery of  tracks,  37  ;  tracks  of  Dinosaurs,  39 ;  species  named 
from  tracks,  41  ;  footprints  aid  in  determining  attitude  of  ani- 
mals, 43 ;  tracks  at  Carson  City,  45 ;  references,  47. 


CONTENTS 


IV.  RULERS  OF  THE  ANCIENT  SEAS 

The  Mosasaurs,  49  ;  history  of  the  first  known  Mosasaur,  50  ; 
jaws  of  reptiles,  53 ;  extinction  of  Mosasaurs,  55 ;  the  sea- 
serpent,  56 ;  Zeuglodon,  58  ;  its  habits,  59  ;  Koch's  Hydrar- 
chus,  61  ;  bones  collected  by  Mr.  Schuchert,  63 ;  abundance 
of  sharks,  64  ;  the  great  Carcharodon,  65  ;  arrangement  of 
sharks'  teeth,  67  ;  references,  68. 

V.  BIRDS  OF  OLD 

Earliest  birds,  70 ;  wings,  71  ;  study  of  young  animals,  73  ; 
the  curious  Hoactzin,  74  ;  first  intimation  of  birds,  76 ;  Archae- 
opteryx,  77  ;  birds  with  teeth,  78  ;  cretaceous  birds,  79  ;  Hes- 
perornis,  80  ;  loss  of  power  of  flight,  81  ;  covering  of  Hesper- 
ornis,  82  ;  attitude  of  Hesperornis,  83  ;  curious  position  of 
legs,  84  ;  toothed  birds  disappointing,  85  ;  early  development 
of  birds,  86  ;  eggs  of  early  birds,  87  ;  references,  88. 

VI.  THE  DINOSAURS 

Discovery  of  Dinosaur  remains,  90  ;  nearest  relatives  of  Dino- 
saurs,- 91  ;  relation  of  birds  to  reptiles,  92  ;  brain  of  Dino- 
saurs, 93 ;  parallel  between  Dinosaurs  and  Marsupials,  95  ; 
the  great  Brontosaurus,  96  ;  food  of  Dinosaurs,  97  ;  habits  of 
Diplodocus,  99 ;  the  strange  Australian  Moloch,  100 ;  com- 
bats of  Triceratops,  101  ;  skeleton  of  Triceratops,  102  ;  Thes- 
pesius  and  his  kin,  104  ;  the  carnivorous  Ceratosaurus,  106  ; 
Stegosaurus,  the  plated  lizard,  106  ;  references,  109. 

VII.  READING  THE  RIDDLES  OF  THE  ROCKS 

Fossils  regarded  as  sports  of  nature,  111;  qualifications  of  a 
successful  collector,  112;  chances  of  collecting,  114;  excava- 
tion of  fossils,  115;  strengthening  fossils  for  shipment,  117; 
great  size  of  some  specimens,  118;  the  preparation  of  fos- 
sils, 119;  mistakes  of  anatomists,  120;  reconstruction  of 
Triceratops,  121  ;  distinguishing  characters  of  bones,  122 ; 


CONTENTS  vii 

the  skeleton  a  problem  in  mechanics,  124  ;  clothing  the  bones 
with  flesh,  127  ;  the  covering  of  animals,  127  ;  outside  orna- 
mentation, 129  ;  probabilities  in  the  covering  of  animals,  130  ; 
impressions  of  extinct  animals,  131  ;  mistaken  inferences 
from  bones  of  Mammoth,  133  ;  coloring  of  large  land  animals, 
134  ;  color  markings  of  young  animals,  136  ;  references,  137. 

VIII.  FEATHERED  GIANTS 

Legend  of  the  Moa,  139  ;  our  knowledge  of  the  Moas,  141  ; 
some  Moas  wingless,  142 ;  deposits  of  Moa  bones,  143  ;  le- 
gend of  the  Roc,  144  ;  discovery  of  ^Epyornis,  145  ;  large- 
sounding  names,  146  ;  eggs  of  great  birds,  147  ;  the  Patago- 
nian  Phororhacos,  149 ;  the  huge  Brontornis,  150 ;  develop- 
ment of  giant  birds,  153  ;  distribution  of  flightless  birds,  154 ; 
relation  between  flightlessness  and  size,  156  ;  references,  156. 

IX.  THE  ANCESTRY  OF  THE  HORSE 

North  America  in  the  Eocene  age,  160 ;  appearance  of  early 
horses,  163 ;  early  domestication  of  the  horse,  165  ;  the  toes 
of  horses,  166  ;  Miocene  horses  small,  167  ;  evidence  of  gene- 
alogy of  the  horse,  170 ;  meaning  of  abnormalities,  170 ; 
changes  in  the  climate  and  animals  of  the  West,  174  ;  refer- 
ences, 176. 

X.  THE  MAMMOTH 

The  story  of  the  killing  of  the  Mammoth,  177  ;  derivation  of 
the  word  "  mammoth,"  178  ;  mistaken  ideas  as  to  size  of  the 
Mammoth,  179 ;  size  of  Mammoth  and  modern  elephants, 
180 ;  finding  of  an  entire  Mammoth,  182 ;  birthplace  of  the 
Mammoth,  184  ;  beliefs  concerning  its  bones,  185  ;  the  range 
of  the  animal,  186  ;  theories  concerning  the  extinction  of  the 
Mammoth,  188 ;  Man  and  Mammoth,  189  ;  origin  of  the 
Alaskan  Live  Mammoth  Story,  190;  traits  of  the  Innuits, 
192 ;  an  entire  Mammoth  recently  found,  194 ;  references, 
195. 


viii  CONTENTS 

XI.  THE  MASTODON 

Differences  between  Mastodon  and  Mammoth,  198 ;  affinities 
of  the  Mastodon,  200  ;  vestigial  structures,  201  ;  distribution 
of  American  Mastodon,  203  ;  first  noticed  in  North  America, 
204  ;  thought  to  be  carnivorous,  206 ;  Koch's  Missourium, 
208  ;  former  abundance  of  Mastodons,  209  ;  appearance  of 
the  animal,  210;  its  size,  211  ;  was  man  contemporary  with 
Mastodon?  213;  the  Lenape  stone,  215;  legend  of  the  big 
buffalo,  216 ;  references,  218. 

XII.  WHY  DO  ANIMALS  BECOME  EXTINCT? 

Extinction  sometimes  evolution,  221  ;  over-specialization  as  a 
cause  for  extinction,  222  ;  extinction  sometimes  unaccounta- 
ble, 223 ;  man's  capability  for  harm  small  in  the  past,  224  ; 
old  theories  of  great  convulsions,  226  ;  changes  in  nature  slow, 
227  ;  the  case  of  Lingula,  228  ;  local  extermination,  229  ;  the 
Moas  and  the  Great  Auk,  232 ;  the  case  of  large  animals, 
233 ;  interdependence  of  living  beings,  234 ;  coyotes  and 
fruit,  236  ;  Shaler  on  the  Miocene  flora  of  Europe,  236  ;  man's 
desire  for  knowledge,  238. 

INDEX,  .         .         . 243 


NOTE   ON   THE   ILLUSTRATIONS 

The  original  drawings,  made  especially  for  this  book, 
are  by  Charles  R.  Knight  and  James  M.  Gleeson, 
under  the  direction  of  Mr.  Knight.  The  fact  that  the 
originals  of  these  drawings  have  been  presented  to  and 
accepted  by  the  United  States  National  Museum  is 
evidence  of  their  scientific  value.  Mr.  Knight  has 
been  commissioned  by  the  Smithsonian  Institution,  the 
United  States  National  Museum,  and  the  New  York 
Museum  of  Natural  History,  to  do  their  most  im- 
portant pictures  of  extinct  animals.  He  is  the  one 
modern  artist  who  can  picture  prehistoric  animals 
with  artistic  charm  of  presentation  as  well  as  with  full 
scientific  accuracy.  In  this  instance,  the  author  has 
personally  superintended  the  artist's  work,  so  that  it  is 
as  correct  in  every  respect  as  present  knowledge  makes 
possible.  Of  the  minor  illustrations,  some  are  by  Mr. 
Bruce  Horsfall,  an  artist  attached  to  the  staff  of  the 
New  York  Museum  of  Natural  History,  and  all  have 
been  drawn  with  the  help  of  and  under  the  author's 
supervision. 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

Phororhacos,  a  Patagonian  Giant  of  the  Miocene 

Frontispiece 
From  a  Drawing  by  Charles  M.  Knight 

Fig.  Page 

1.  Diplomystus,  an  Ancient   Member   of  the 

Shad  Family 4 

From  the  fish-bed  at  Green  River,  Wyoming.     From  a 
specimen  in  the  United  States  National  Museum. 

2.  Bryozoa,   from  the  Shore  of  the  Devonian 

Sea  that  Covered  Eastern  New  York       .     10 
From  a  specimen  in  Yale  University  Museum,  prepared 
by  Dr.  Beecher. 

3.  Skeleton  of  a  Radiolarian  Very  Greatly  En- 

larged .         .         ..         .         .         .          .17 

4.  Cephalaspis  and  Loricaria,  an  Ancient  and 

a  Modern  Armored  Fish          ,         .         .24 

5.  Pterichthys,  the  Wing  Fish        ,         .         .32 

6.  Where  a  Dinosaur  Sat  Down      .  .38 

7.  Footprints  of  Dinosaurs  on  the  Brownstone 

of  the  Connecticut  Valley        ...     40 
From  a  slab  in  the  museum  of  Amherst  College. 


xii  LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

Fig.  Page 

8.  The  Track  of  a  Three-toed  Dinosaur          .     47 

9.  A  Great  Sea  Lizard,  Tylosaurus  Dyspelor    .     52 
From  a  drawing  by  J.  M.  Oleeson. 

10.  Jaw  of  a  Mosasaur,  Showing  the  Joint  that 

Increased  the  Swallowing  Capacity  of  that 
Reptile 54 

11.  Koch's  Hydrarchus.     Composed  of  Portions 

of  the  Skeletons  of  Several  Zeuglodons      .     62 

12.  A  Tooth  of  Zeuglodon,  One  of  the  "Yoke 

Teeth,"  from  which  it  derives  the  name     .     69 

13.  Archaeopteryx,  the  Earliest  Known  Bird       .     70 
From  the  specimen  in  the  Berlin  Museum. 

14.  Nature's  Four  Methods  of  Making  a  Wing  : 

Bat,    Pteryodactyl,    Archaeopteryx,    and 
Modern  Bird 72 

15.  Young  Hoactzins       .         .         .         .         .75 

16.  Hesperornis,  the  Great  Toothed  Diver          .     82 
From  a  drawing  by  J.  M.  Oleeson. 

17.  Archaeopteryx  .          .          ...     89 
As  Restored  by  Mr.  Pycraft. 

18.  Thespesius,  a  Common  Herbivorous  Dinosaur 

of  the  Cretaceous          .         .         .         .90 
From  a  drawing  by  Charles  R.  Knight. 

19.  A  Hind  Leg  of  the  Great  Brontosaurus,  the 

Largest  of  the  Dinosaurs         .         .         .96 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS  xiii 

Fig.  Page 

20.  A  Single  Vertebra  of  Brontosaurus      .         .     97 

21.  Moloch,  a  Modern  Lizard  that  Surpasses  the 

Stegosaurs  in  All  but  Size       .         .         .  100 
From  a  drawing  by  J.  M.  Oleeson. 

22.  Skeleton    of  Triceratops  .....  103 

23.  The   Horned   Ceratosaurus,   a  Carnivorous 

Dinosaur 106 

From  a  drawing  by  J.  M.  Oleeson. 

24.  Stegosaurus,  an    Armored   Dinosaur   of  the 

Jurassic         ......  108 

From  a  drawing  by  Charles  R.  Knight. 

25.  Skull  of  Ceratosaurus         .         .         .          .110 
From  a  specimen  in  the  United  States  National  Mttseum. 

26.  Triceratops,  He  of  the  Three-horned  Face  126 
From  a  statuette  by  Charles  R.  Knight. 

27.  A  Hint  of  Buried  Treasures       .         .         .  137 

28.  Relics  of  the  Moa  .      "   .         .         .         .140 

29.  Eggs     of    Feathered     Giants,     ./Epyornis, 

Ostrich,   Moa,    Compared  with   a   Hen's 
Egg 148 

30.  Skull  of  Phororhacos  Compared  with  that 

of  the  Race-horse  Lexington          .         .151 

31.  Leg  of  a  Horse  Compared  with  that  of  the 

Giant  Moa   .  .152 


xiv  LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

Fig.  Page 

32.  The  Three  Giants,  Phororhacos,  Moa,  Os- 

trich      158 

33.  Skeleton  of  the  Modern  Horse  and  of  His 

Eocene  Ancestor     .         .         .         .  161 

34.  The  Development  of  the  Horse          .         .168 

35.  The  Mammoth 176 

From  a  drawing  by  Charles  R.  Knight. 

36.  Skeleton   of  the  Mammoth  in    the   Royal 

Museum  of  St.  Petersburg       .         .          .183 

37.  The  Mammoth          .          .          .          .          .   196 
As  engraved  by  a  Primitive  Artist  on  a  Piece  of  Mam- 
moth-Tusk. 

38.  Tooth  of  Mastodon  and  of  Mammoth  .  199 

39.  The  Missourium  of  Koch  ....  207 
From  a  Tracing  of  the  Figure  Illustrating  Koch's  De- 
scription. 

40.  The  Mastodon 210 

From  a  drawing  by  J.  M.  Gleeson. 

41.  The  Lenape  Stone,  Reduced        .         .         .219 


INTRODUCTORY  AND  EXPLANA- 
TORY 

At  the  present  time  the  interest  in  the  ancient 
life  of  this  earth  is  greater  than  ever  before,  and 
very  considerable  sums  of  money  are  being  ex- 
pended to  dispatch  carefully  planned  expeditions 
to  various  parts  of  the  world  systematically  to 
gather  the  fossil  remains  of  the  animals  of  the 
past.  That  this  interest  is  not  merely  confined 
to  a  few  scientific  men,  but  is  shared  by  the  gen- 
eral public,  is  shown  by  the  numerous  articles, 
including  many  telegrams,  in  the  columns  of  the 
daily  papers.  The  object  of  this  book  is  to  tell 
some  of  the  interesting  facts  concerning  a  few  of 
the  better  known  or  more  remarkable  of  these 
extinct  inhabitants  of  the  ancient  world;  also, 
if  possible,  to  ease  the  strain  on  these  venerable 
animals,  caused  by  stretching  them  so  often  be- 
yond their  due  proportions. 

The  book  is  admittedly  somewhat  on  the  lines 


xvi      INTRODUCTORY    AND   EXPLANATORY 

of  Mr.  Hutchinsons  "Extinct  Monsters"  and 
"  Creatures  of  Other  Days"  but  it  is  hoped  that 
it  may  be  considered  with  books  as  with  boats, 
a  good  plan  to  build  after  a  good  model.  The 
information  scattered  through  these  pages  has 
been  derived  from  varied  sources ;  some  has  of 
necessity  been  taken  from  standard  books,  a 
part  has  been  gathered  in  the  course  of  museum 
work  and  official  correspondence;  for  much,  the 
author  is  indebted  to  his  personal  friends,  and 
for  apart,  he  is  under  obligations  to  friends  he 
has  never  met,  who  have  kindly  responded  to  his 
inquiries.  The  endeavor  has  been  conscientiously 
made  to  exclude  all  misinformation;  it  is,  never- 
theless, entirely  probable  that  some  mistakes  may 
have  crept  in,  and  due  apology  for  these  is  here- 
by made  beforehand. 

The  author  expects  to  be  taken  to  task  for 
the  use  of  scientific  names,  and  the  reader  may 
perhaps  sympathize  with  the  old  lady  who  said 
that  the  discovery  of  all  these  strange  animals 
did  not  surprise  her  so  much  as  the  fact  that 
anyone  should  know  their  names  when  they  were 
found.  The  real  trouble  is  that  there  are  no 
common  names  for  these  animals.  Then,  too, 


INTRODUCTORY   AND   EXPLANATORY    xvii 

people  who  call  for  easier  names  do  not  stop  to 
reflect  that,  in  many  cases,  the  scientific  names  are 
no  harder  than  others,  simply  less  familiar,  and, 
when  domesticated,  they  cease  to  be  hard:  witness 
mammoth,  elephant,  rhinoceros,  giraffe,  boa  con- 
strictor, all  of  which  are  scientific  names.  And 
if,  for  example,  we  were  to  call  the  Hyracothe- 
rium  a  Hyrax  beast  it  would  not  be  a  name, 
but  a  description,  and  not  a  bit  more  intelli- 
gible. 

Again,  it  is  impossible  to  indicate  the  period 
at  which  these  creatures  lived  without  using  the 
scientific  term  for  it  —  Jurassic*  Eocene,  Plio- 
cene, as  the  case  may  be — because  there  is  no 
other  way  of  doing  it. 

Some  readers  will  doubtless  feel  disappointed 
because  they  are  not  told  how  many  years  ago 
these  animals  lived.  The  question  is  often  asked — 
How  long  ago  did  this  or  that  animal  live  ?  But 
when  the  least  estimate  puts  the  age  of  the  earth 
at  only  10,000,000  years,  while  the  longest  makes 
it  6,000,000,000,  it  does  seem  as  if  it  were  hardly 
worth  while  to  name  any  figures.  Even  when 
we  get  well  toward  the  .present  period  we  find 
the  time  that  has  elapsed  since  the  beginning  of 


xviii    INTRODUCTORY   AND   EXPLANATORY 

the  Jurassic,  when  the  Dinosaurs  held  carnival, 
variously  put  at  from  15,000,000  to  6,000,000 
years;  while  from  the  beginning  of  the  Eocene, 
when  the  mammals  began  to  gain  the  suprem- 
acy, until  now,  the  figures  vary  from  3,000,000 
to  5,000,000  years.  So  the  question  of  age  will 
be  left  for  the  reader  to  settle  to  his  or  her  satis- 
faction. 

The  restorations  of  extinct  animals  may  be 
considered  as  giving  as  accurate  representations 
of  these  creatures  as  it  is  possible  to  make  ;  they 
were  either  drawn  by  Mr.  Knight,  whose  name 
is  guarantee  that  they  are  of  the  highest  quality, 
or  by  Mr.  Gleeson,  with  the  aid  of  Mr.  Knighfs 
criticism.  That  they  are  infallibly  correct  is  out 
of  the  question  ;  for,  as  Dr.  Woodward  writes 
in  the  preface  to  "  Extinct  Monsters,"  "  restora- 
tions are  ever  liable  to  emendation,  and  the  pres- 
ent .  .  .  will  certainly  prove  no  exception 
to  the  rule."  As  a  striking  instance  of  this,  it 
was  found  necessary  at  the  last  moment  to 
change  the  figure  of  Hesperornis,  the  original 
life-like  portrait  proving  to  be  incorrect  in 
attitude,  a  fact  that  would  have  long  escaped 
detection  but  for  the  Pan-American  Exposition. 


INTRODUCTORY    AND   EXPLANATORY      xix 

The  connection  between  the  two  is  explained  on 
page  76.  However,  the  reader  may  rest  as- 
sured that  these  restorations  are  infinitely  more 
nearly  correct  than  many  figures  of  living 
animals  that  have  appeared  within  the  last 
twenty-five  years,  and  are  even  now  doing 
duty. 

The  endeavor  has  been  made  to  indicate,  at  the 
end  of  each  chapter,  the  museums  in  which  the 
best  examples  of  the  animals  described  may  be 
seen,  and  also  some  book  or  article  in  which  fur- 
ther information  may  be  obtained.  As  this  book 
is  intended  for  the  general  reader,  references  to 
purely  technical  articles  have,  so  far  as  possible, 
been  avoided,  and  none  in  foreign  languages 
mentioned. 

For  important  works  of  reference  on  the 
subject  of  paleontology,  the  reader  may  consult 
"A  Manual  of  Paleontology,"  by  Alleyne  Nich- 
olson and  R.  Lydekker,  a  work  in  two  volumes 
dealing  with  invertebrates,  vertebrates,  and 
plants,  or  "A  Text- Book  of  Paleontology,"  by 
Karl  von  Zittel,  English  edition,  only  the  first 
volume  of  which  has  so  far  been  published.  A  n 
admirable  book  on  the  vertebrates  is  "Outlines 


xx   INTRODUCTORY  AND  EXPLANATORY 

of  Vertebrate  Paleontology"  by  Arthur  Smith 
Woodward.  It  is  to  be  understood  that  these 
are  not  at  all  "popular"  in  their  scope,  but 
intended  for  students  who  are  already  well 
advanced  in  the  study  of  zoology. 


ANIMALS   OF  THE  PAST 


FOSSILS,   AND   HOW   THEY   ARE   FORMED 


"  How  of  a  thousand  snakes  each  one 
Was  changed  into  a  coil  of  stone" 

Fossils  are  the  remains,  or  even  the  indica- 
tions, of  animals  and  plants  that  have,  through 
natural  agencies,  been  buried  in  the  earth  and 
preserved  for  long  periods  of  time.  This  may 
seem  a  rather  meagre  definition,  but  it  is  a  dif- 
ficult  matter  to  frame  one  that  will  be  at  once 
\  brief,  exact,  and  comprehensive  ;  fossils  are  not 
^*  necessarily  the  remains  of  extinct  animals  or 
plants,  neither  are  they,  of  necessity,  objects 
that  have  become  petrified  or  turned  into  stone. 
^  Bpnes^of  the  Great  Auk  and  Rytina,  which 
are  quite  extinct,  would  hardly  be  considered 
as  fossils  ;  while  the  bones  of  many  species  of 
animals,  still  living,  would  properly  come  in 
that  category,  having  long  ago  been  buried  by 
natural  causes  and  often  been  changed  into 


2  ANIMALS  OF  THE  PAST 

stone.  And  yet  it  is  not  essential  for  a  speci- 
men to  have  had  its  animal  matter  replaced  by 
some  mineral  in  order  that  it  may  be  classed  as 
a  fossil,  for  the  Siberian  Mammoths,  found  en- 
tombed in  ice,  are  very  properly  spoken  of  as 
fossils,  although  the  flesh  of  at  least  one  of  these 
animals  was  so  fresh  that  it  was  eaten.  Like- 
wise the  mammoth  tusks  brought  to  market 
are  termed  fossil-ivory,  although  differing  but 
little  from  the  tusks  of  modern  elephants. 

Many  fossils  indeed  merit  their  popular  ap- 
pellation of  petrifactions,  because  they  have 
been  changed  into  stone  by  the  slow  removal 
of  the  animal  or  vegetable  matter  present  and 
its  replacement  by  some  mineral,  usually  silica 
or  some  form  of  lime.  But  it  is  necessary  to 
include  '  indications  of  plants  or  animals '  in 
the  above  definition  because  some  of  the  "best 
fossils  may  be  merely  impressions  of  plants  or 
animals  and  no  portion  of  the  objects  them- 
selves, and  yet,  as  we  shall  see,  some  of  our 
most  important  information  has  been  gathered 
from  these  same  imprints. 

Nearly  all  our  knowledge  of  the  plants  that 
flourished  in  the  past  is  based  on  the  imppes- 


FOSSILS,  AND  HOW  THEY  ARE   FORMED    3 

signs  of  their  leaves  left  on  the  soft  mud  or 
smooth  sand  that  later  on  hardened  into  endur- 
ing stone.  Such,  too,  are  the  trails  of  creeping 
and  crawling  things,  casts  of  the  burrows  of 
worms  and  the  many  footprints  of  the  reptiles, 
great  and  small,  that  crept  along  the  shore  or 
stalked  beside  the  waters  of  the  ancient  seas. 
The  creatures  themselves  have  passed  away, 
their  massive  bones  even  are  lost,  but  the  prints 
of  their  feet  are  as  plain  to-day  as  when  they 
were  first  made. 

Many  a  crustacean,  too,  is  known  solely  or 
mostly  by  the  cast  of  its  shell,  the  hard  parts 
having  completely  vanished,  and  the  existence 
of  birds  in  some  formations  is  revealed  merely 
by  the  casts  of  their  eggs ;  and  these  natural 
casts  must  be  included  in  the  category  of 
fossils. 

Impressions  of  vertebrates  may,  indeed,  be 
almost  as  good  as  actual  skeletons,  as  in  the 
case  of  some  fishes,  where  the  fine  mud  in 
which  they  were  buried  has  become  changed 
to  a  rock,  rivalling  porcelain  in  texture;  the 
bones  have  either  dissolved  away  or  shattered 
into  dust  at  the  splitting  of  the  rock,  but  the 


4  ANIMALS  OF  THE   PAST 

imprint  of  each  little  fin-ray  and  every  thread- 
like bone  is  as  clearly  defined  as  it  would  have 
been  in  a  freshly  prepared  skeleton.  So  fine, 
indeed,  may  have  been  the  mud,  and  so  quiet 
for  the  time  being  the  waters  of  the  ancient 
sea  or  lake,  that  not  only  have  prints  of  bones 
and  leaves  been  found,  but  those  of  feathers 
and  of  the  skin  of  some  reptiles,  and  even  of 
such  soft  and  delicate  objects  as  jelly  fishes. 
But  for  these  we  should  have  little  positive 
knowledge  of  the  outward  appearance  of  the 
creatures  of  the  past,  and  to  them  we  are  oc- 
casionally indebted  for  the  solution  of  some 
moot  point  in  their  anatomy. 

The  reader  may  possibly  wonder  why  it  is 
that  fossils  are  not  more  abundant ;  why,  of  the 
vast  majority  of  animals  that  have  dwelt  upon 
the  earth  since  it  became  fit  for  the  habitation 
of  living  beings,  not  a  trace  remains.  This, 
too,  when  some  objects  —  the  tusks  of  the  Mam- 
moth, for  example  —  have  been  sufficiently  well 
preserved  to  form  staple  articles  of  commerce 
at  the  present  time,  so  that  the  carved  handle 
of  my  lady's  parasol  may  have  formed  part  of 
some  animal  that  flourished  at  the  very  dawn 


fa 
t^, 


5 


FOSSILS,  AND   HOW  THEY  ARE   FORMED     5 

of  the  human  race,  and  been  gazed  upon  by 
her  grandfather  a  thousand  times  removed. 
The  answer  to  this  query  is  that,  unless  the  con- 
ditions were  such  as  to  preserve  at  least  the 
hard  parts  of  any  creature  from  immediate  de- 
cay, there  was  small  probability  of  its  becom- 
ing fossilized.  These  conditions  are  that  the 
objects  must  be  protected  from  the  air,  and, 
practically,  the  only  way  that  this  happens  in 
nature  is  by  having  them  covered  with  water, 
or  at  least  buried  in  wet  ground. 

If  an  animal  dies  on  dry  land,  where  its  bones 
lie  exposed  to  the  summer's  sun  and  rain  and 
the  winter's  frost  and  snow,  it  does  not  take 
these  destructive  agencies  long  to  reduce  the 
bones  to  powder;  in  the  rare  event  of  a  cli- 
mate devoid  of  rain,  mere  changes  of  temper- 
ature, by  producing  expansion  and  contraction, 
will  sooner  or  later  cause  a  bone  to  crack  and 
crumble. 

Usually,  too,  the  work  of  the  elements  is 

aided  by  that  of  animals  and  plants.     Every 

a  dog  make  way  with  a  pretty 

ic,  and  the  Hyena  has  still  greater 

that  line ;  and  ever  since  verte- 


6  ANIMALS  OF  THE  PAST 

brate  life  began  there  have  been  carnivorous 
animals  of  some  kind  to  play  the  role  of  bone- 
destroyers.  Even  were  there  no  carnivores, 
there  were  probably  then,  as  now,  rats  and 
mice  a-plenty,  and  few  suspect  the  havoc  small 
rodents  may  play  with  a  bone  for  the  grease  it 
contains,  or  merely  for  the  sake  of  exercising 
their  teeth.  Now  and  then  we  come  upon  a 
fossil  bone,  long  since  turned  into  stone,  on 
which  are  the  marks  of  the  little  cutting  teeth 
of  field  mice,  put  there  long,  long  ago,  and  yet 
looking  as  fresh  as  if  made  only  last  week. 
These  little  beasts,  however,  are  indirect  rather 
than  direct  agents  in  the  destruction  of  bones 
by  gnawing  off  the  outer  layers,  and  thus  per- 
mitting the  more  ready  entrance  of  air  and 
water.  Plants,  as  a  rule,  begin  their  work  after 
an  object  has  become  partly  or  entirely  buried 
in  the  soil,  when  the  tiny  rootlets  find  their 
way  into  fissures,  and,  expanding  as  they  grow, 
act  like  so  many  little  wedges  to  force  it 
asunder. 

Thus  on  dry  land  there  is  small  opportunity 
for  a  bone  to  become  a  fossil ;  but,  if  a  creat- 
ure so  perishes  that  its  body  is  swept  mto  the 


FOSSILS,  AND   HOW   THEY   ARE   FORMED     7 

ocean  or  one  of  its  estuaries,  settles  to  the 
muddy  bottom  of  a  lake  or  is  caught  on  the 
sandy  shoals  of  some  river,  the  chances  are 
good  that  its  bones  will  be  preserved.  They 
are  poorest  in  the  ocean,  for  unless  the  body 
drifts  far  out  and  settles  down  in  quiet  waters, 
the  waves  pound  the  bones  to  pieces  with  stones 
or  scour  them  away  with  sand,  while  marine 
worms  may  pierce  them  with  burrows,  or 
echinoderms  cut  holes  for  their  habitations ; 
there  are  more  enemies  to  a  bone  than  one 
might  imagine. 

Suppose,  however,  that  some  animal  has 
sunk  in  the  depths  of  a  quiet  lake,  where  the 
wash  of  the  waves  upon  the  shore  wears  the 
sand  or  rock  into  mud  so  fine  that  it  floats  out 
into  still  water  and  settles  there  as  gently  as 
dew  upon  the  grass.  Little  by  little  the  bones 
are  covered  by  a  deposit  that  fills  every  groove 
and  pore,  preserving  the  mark  of  every  ridge 
and  furrow ;  and  while  this  may  take  long,  it 
is  merely  a  matter  of  time  and  favorable  cir- 
cumstance to  bury  the  bones  as  deeply  as  one 
might  wish.  Scarce  a  reader  of  these  lines  but 
at  some  time  has  cast  anchor  in  some  quiet 


8  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

pond  and  pulled  it  up,  thickly  covered  with 
sticky  mud,  whose  existence  would  hardly  be 
suspected  from  the  sparkling  waters  and  pebbly 
shores.  If,  instead  of  a  lake,  our  animal  had 
gone  to  the  bottom  of  some  estuary  into  which 
poured  a  river  turbid  with  mud,  the  process  of 
entombment  would  have  been  still  more  rapid, 
while,  had  the  creature  been  engulfed  in  quick- 
sand, it  would  have  been  the  quickest  method 
of  all ;  and  just  such  accidents  did  take  place 
in  the  early  days  of  the  earth  as  well  as  now. 
At  least  two  examples  of  the  great  Dinosaur 
Thespesius  have  been  found  with  the  bones  all 
in  place,  the  thigh  bones  still  in  their  sockets 
and  the  ossified  tendons  running  along  the 
backbone  as  they  did  in  life.  This  would 
hardly  have  happened  had  not  the  body  been 
surrounded  and  supported  so  that  every  part 
was  held  in  place  and  not  crushed,  and  it  is 
difficult  to  see  any  better  agency  for  this  than 
burial  in  quicksand. 

If  such  an  event  as  we  have  been  supposing 
took  place  in  a  part  of  the  globe  where  the 
land  was  gradually  sinking  — and  the  crust  of 
the  earth  is  ever  rising  and  falling  —  the  mud 


FOSSILS,  AND   HOW  THEY   ARE   FORMED     9 

and  sand  would  keep  on  accumulating  until 
an  enormously  thick  layer  was  formed.  The 
lime  or  silica  contained  in  the  water  would 
tend  to  cement  the  particles  of  mud  and  grains 
of  sand  into  a  solid  mass,  while  the  process 
would  be  aided  by  the  pressure  of  the  overly- 
ing sediment,  the  heat  created  by  this  press- 
ure, and  that  derived  from  the  earth  beneath. 
During  this  process  the  animal  matter  of  bones 
or  other  objects  would  disappear  and  its  place 
be  taken  by  lime  or  silica,  and  thus  would  be 
formed  a  layer  of  rock  containing  fossils.  The 
exact  manner  in  which  this  replacement  is 
effected  and  in  which  the  chemical  and  me- 
chanical changes  occur  is  very  far  from  being 
definitely  known  —  especially  as  the  process  of 
"  fossilization  "  must  at  times  have  been  very 
complicated. 

In  the  case  of  fossil  wood  greater  changes 
have  taken  place  than  in  the  fossilization  of 
bone,  for  there  is  not  merely  an  infiltration 
of  the  specimen  but  a  complete  replacement  of 
the  original  vegetable  by  mineral  matter,  the 
interior  of  the  cells  being  first  filled  with  silica 
and  their  walls  replaced  later  on.  So  com- 


10  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

pletely  and  minutely  may  this  change  occur 
that  under  the  microscope  the  very  cellular 
structure  of  the  wood  is  visible,  and  as  this 
varies  according  to  the  species,  it  is  possible, 
by  microscopical  examination,  to  determine 
the  relationship  of  trees  in  cases  where  noth- 
ing but  fragments  of  the  trunk  remain. 

The  process  of  fossilization  is  at  best  a  slow 
one,  and  soft  substances  such  as  flesh,  or  even 
horn,  decay  too  rapidly  for  it  to  take  place,  so 
that  all  accounts  of  petrified  bodies,  human  or 
otherwise,  are  either  based  on  deliberate  frauds 
or  are  the  result  of  a  very  erroneous  misinter- 
pretation of  facts.  That  the  impression  or 
cast  of  a  body  might  be  formed  in  nature, 
somewhat  as  casts  have  been  made  of  those 
who  perished  at  Pompeii,  is  true  ;  but,  so  far,  no 
authentic  case  of  the  kind  has  come  to  light, 
and  the  reader  is  quite  justified  in  disbelieving 
any  report  of  "  a  petrified  man.'V 

Natural  casts  of  such  hard  bodies  as  shells 
are  common,  formed  by  the  dissolving  away  of 
the  original  shell  after  it  had  become  enclosed 
in  mud,  or  even  after  this  had  changed  to 
stone,  and  the  filling  up  of  this  space  by  the 


FOSSILS,  AND  HOW  THEY  ARE  FORMED     II 

filtering  in  of  water  charged  with  lime  or  sili- 
ca, which  is  there  deposited,  often  in  crystal- 
line form.  In  this  way,  too,  are  formed  casts 
of  eggs  of  reptiles  and  birds,  so  perfect  that  it 
is  possible  to  form  a  pretty  accurate  opinion 
as  to  the  group  to  which  they  belong. 

Sometimes  it  happens  that  shells  or  other 
small  objects  imbedded  in  limestone  have  been 
dissolved  and  replaced  by  silica,  and  in  such 
cases  it  is  possible  to  eat  away  the  enveloping 
rock  with  acid  and  leave  the  silicified  casts, 
By  this  method  specimens  of  shells,  corals, 
and  bryozoans  are  obtained  of  almost  lace-like 
delicacy,  and  as  perfect  as  if  only  yesterday 
gathered  at  the  sea-shore.  Casts  of  the  interior 
of  shells,  showing  many  details  of  structure, 
are  common,  and  anyone  who  has  seen  clams 
dug  will  understand  how  they  are  formed 
by  the  entrance  of  mud  into  the  empty  shell. 

Casts  of  the  kernels  of  nuts  are  formed  in 
much  the  same  way,  and  Professor  E.  H.  Bar- 
bour  has  thus  described  the  probable  manner 
in  which  this  was  done.  When  the  ijuts  were 
dropped  into  the  water  of  the  ancient  lake  the 
kernel  rotted  away,  but  the  shell,  being  tough 


19  ANIMALS  OF  THE   PAST 

and  hard,  would  probably  last  for  years  un- 
der favorable  circumstances.  Throughout  the 
marls  and  clays  of  the  Bad  Lands  (of  South 
Dakota)  there  is  a  large  amount  of  potash. 
This  is  dissolved  by  water,  and  then  acts  upon 
quartz,  carrying  it  away  in  solution.  This 
would  find  its  way  by  infiltration  into  the  jn- 
terior  of  thejnut.  At  the  same  time  with  this 
process,  carrying  lime  carbonate  in  solution 
was  going  on,  so  that  doubtless  the  stone  ker- 
nels, consisting  of  pretty  nearly  equal  parts  of 
lime  and  silica,  were  deposited  within  the  nuts. 
These  kernels,  of  course,  became  hard  and 
flinty  in  time,  and  capable  of  resisting  almost 
any  amount  of  weathering.  Not  so  the  or- 
ganic shell ;  this  eventually  would  decay  away, 
and  so  leave  the  filling  or  kernel  of  chalcedony 
and  lime.* 

"  Fossil  leaves "  are  nothing  but  fine  casts, 
made  in  natural  moulds,  and  all  have  seen 
the  first  stages  in  their  formation  as  they 

*  Right  here  w  the  weak  spot  in  Professor  Barbour's  ex- 
planation, and  an  illustration  of  our  lack  of  knowledge.  For 
it  is  difficult  to  see  why  the  more  enduring  husk  should  not  have 
become  mineralized  equally  with  the  cavity  within. 


FOSSILS,  AND   HOW  THEY  ARE   FORMED     13 

watched  the  leaves  sailing  to  the  ground  to  be 
covered  by  mud  or  sand  at  the  next  rain,  or 
dropping  into  the  water,  where  sooner  or  later 
they  sink,  as  we  may  see  them  at  the  bottom 
of  any  quiet  woodland  spring. 

Impressions  of  leaves  are  among  the  early 
examples  of  color-printing,  for  they  are  fre- 
quently of  a  darker,  or  even  different,  tint  from 
that  of  the  surrounding  rock,  this  being  caused 
by  the  carbonization  of  vegetable  matter  or  to 
its  action  on  iron  that  may  have  been  present 
in  the  soil  or  water.  Besides  complete  miner- 
alization, or  petrifaction,  there  are  numerous 
cases  of  incomplete  or  semi-fossilization,  where 
modern  objects,  still  retaining  their  phosphate 
of  lime  and  some  animal  matter  even,  are 
found  buried  in  rock.  This  takes  place  when 
water  containing  carbonate  of  lime,  silica,  or 
sometimes  iron,  flows  over  beds  of  sand,  ce- 
menting the  grains  into  solid  but  not  dense 
rock,  and  at  the  same  time  penetrating  and 
uniting  with  it  such  things  as  chance  to  be  bur- 
ied. In  this  way  was  formed  the  "  fossil  man  " 
of  Guadeloupe,  West  Indies,  a  skeleton  of  a 
modern  Carib  lying  in  recent  concretionary 


14  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

limestone,  together  with  shells  of  existing  spe- 
cies and  fragments  of  pottery.  In  a  similar  way, 
too,  human  remains  in  parts  of  Florida  have, 
through  the  infiltration  of  water  charged  with 
iron,  become  partially  converted  into  limonite 
iron  ore ;  and  yet  we  know  that  these  bones 
have  been  buried  within  quite  recent  times. 

Sometimes  we  hear  of  springs  or  waters  that 
"  turn  things  into  stone,"  but  these  tales  are 
quite  incorrect.  Waters  there  are,  like  the 
celebrated  hot  springs  of  Auvergne,  France, 
containing  so  much  carbonate  of  lime  in  solu- 
tion that  it  is  readily  deposited  on  objects 
placed  therein,  coating  them  more  or  less 
thickly,  according  to  the  length  of  time  they 
are  allowed  to  remain.  This,  however,  is  mere- 
ly an  encrustation,  not  extending  into  the  ob- 
jects. In  a  similar  way  the  precipitation  of 
solid  material  from  waters  of  this  description 
forms  the  porous  rock  known  as  tufa,  and  this 
often  encloses  moss,  twigs,  and  other  substances 
that  are  in  no  way  to  be  classed  with  fossils. 

But  some  streams,  flowing  over  limestone 
rocks,  take  up  considerable  carbonate  of  lime, 
and  this  may  be  deposited  in  water-soaked  logs, 


FOSSILS,  AND  HOW  THEY  ARE   FORMED     15 

replacing  more  or  less  of  the  woody  tissue  and 
thus  really  partially  changing  the  wood  into 
stone. 

The  very  rocks  themselves  may  consist  large- 
ly of  fossils ;  chalk,  for  example,  is  mainly  made 
up  of  the  disintegrated  shells  of  simple  marine 
animals  called  foraminifers,  and  the  beautiful 
flint-like  "  skeletons  "  of  other  small  creatures 
termed  rj^diolarians,  minute  as  they  are,  have 
contributed  extensively  to  the  formation  of 
some  strata. 

Even  after  an  object  has  become  fossilized, 
it  is  far  from  certain  that  it  will  remain  in  good 
condition  until  found,  while  the  chance  of  its 
being  found  at  all  is  exceedingly  small.  When 
we  remember  that  it  is  only  here  and  there 
that  nature  has  made  the  contents  of  the  rocks 
accessible  by  turning  the  strata  on  edge,  heav- 
ing them  into  cliffs  or  furrowing  them  with 
valleys  and  canyons,  we  realize  what  a  vast 
number  of  pages  of  the  fossil  record  must 
remain  not  only  unread,  but  unseen.  The 
wonder  is,  not  that  we  know  so  little  of 
the  history  of  the  past,  but  that  we  have 
learned  so  much,  for  not  only  is  nature  care- 


16  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

less  in  keeping  the  records  —  preserving  them 
mostly  in  scattered  fragments —  but  after  they 
have  been  laid  away  and  sealed  up  in  the  rocks 
they  are  subject  to  many  accidents.  Some 
specimens  get  badly  flattened  by  the  weight 
of  subsequently  deposited  strata,  others  are 
cracked  and  twisted  by  the  movements  of  the 
rocks  during  periods  of  upheaval  or  subsidence, 
and  when  at  last  they  are  brought  to  the  sur- 
face, the  same  sun  and  rain,  snow  and  frost, 
from  which  they  once  escaped,  are  ready  to 
renew  the  attack  and  crumble  even  the  hard 
stone  to  fragments.  Such,  very  briefly,  are 
some  of  the  methods  by  which  fossils  may  be 
formed,  such  are  some  of  the  accidents  by 
which  they  may  be  destroyed  ;  but  this  descrip- 
tion must  be  taken  as  a  mere  outline  and  as 
applying  mainly  to  vertebrates,  or  backboned 
animals,  since  it  is  with  them  that  we  shall  have 
to  deal.  It  may,  however,  show  why  it  is  that 
fossils  are  not  more  plentiful,  why  we  have 
mere  hints  of  the  existence  of  many  animals, 
and  why  myriads  of  creatures  may  have  flour- 
ished and  passed  away  without  so  much  as 
leaving  a  trace  of  their  presence  behind. 


FOSSILS,  AND  HOW  THEY  ARE  FORMED  17 
REFERENCES 

A  very  valuable  and  interesting  article  by  Dr.  Charles 
A.  White,  entitled  "  The  Relation  of  Biology  to  Geo- 
logical Investigation"  will  be  found  in  the  Report  of  the 
United  States  National  Museum  for  1892.  This  com- 
prises a  series  of  essays  on  the  nature  and  scientific  uses 
of  fossil  remains,  their  origin,  relative  chronological 
value  and  other  questions  pertaining  to  them.  The  United 
States  National  Museum  has  published  a  pamphlet,  part 
K,  Bulletin  39,  containing  directions  for  collecting  and 
preparing  fossils,  by  Charles  Schuchert ;  and  another, 
part  B,  Bulletin  39,  collecting  recent  and  fossil  plants, 
by  F.  H.  Knowlton. 


Fig.  3. — Skeleton  of  a  Radiolarian  Very  Qreatly  Enlarged. 


II 

THE  EARLIEST   KNOWN  VERTEBRATES 

"We  are  the  ancients  of  the  earth 
And  in  the  morning  of  the  times." 

There  is  a  universal,  and  perfectly  natural,  de- 
sire for  information,  which  in  ourselves  we  term 
thirst  for  knowledge  and  in  others  call  curiosity, 
that  makes  mankind  desire  to  know  how  every- 
thing began  and  causes  much  speculation  as  to 
how  it  all  will  end.  This  may  take  the  form 
of  a  wish  to  know  how  a  millionaire  made  his 
first  ten  cents,  or  it  may  lead  to  the  questions 
—What  is  the  oldest  animal  ?  or,  What  is  the 
first  known  member  of  the  great  group  of  back- 
boned animals  at  whose  head  man  has  placed 
himself?  and, What  did  this,  our  primeval  and 
many-times-removed  ancestor,  look  like  ?  The 
question  is  one  that  has  ever  been  full  of  inter- 
est for  naturalists,  and  Nature  has  been  inter- 
rogated in  various  ways  in  the  hope  that  she 

18 


THE   EARLIEST   KNOWN   VERTEBRATES     19 

might  be  persuaded  to  yield  a  satisfactory  an- 
swer. The  most  direct  way  has  been  that  of 
tracing  back  the  history  of  animal  life  by  means 
of  fossil  remains,  but  beyond  a  certain  point 
this  method  cannot  go,  since,  for  reasons  stated 
in  various  places  in  these  pages,  the  soft 
bodies  of  primitive  animals  are  not  preserved. 
To  supplement  this  work,  the  embryologist  has 
studied  the  early  stages  of  animals,  as  their  de- 
velopment throws  a  side-light  on  their  past 
history.  And,  finally,  there  is  the  study  of  the 
varied  forms  of  invertebrates,  some  of  which 
have  proved  to  be  like  vertebrates  in  part  of 
their  structure,  while  others  have  been  revealed 
as  vertebrates  in  disguise.  So  far  these  various 
methods  have  yielded  various  answers,  or  the 
replies,  like  those  of  the  Delphic  Oracle,  have 
been  variously  interpreted  so  that  vertebrates 
are  considered  by  some  to  have  descended  from 
the  worms,  while  others  have  found  their  begin- 
nings in  some  animal  allied  to  the  King  Crab. 
Every  student  of  genealogy  knows  only  too 
well  how  difficult  a  matter  it  is  to  trace  a  fam- 
ily pedigree  back  a  few  centuries,  how  soon  the 
family  names  become  changed,  the  line  of  de- 


20  ANIMALS  OF  THE   PAST 

scent  obscure,  and  how  soon  gaps  appear  whose 
filling  in  requires  much  patient  research.  How 
much  more  difficult  must  it  be,  then,  to  trace 
the  pedigree  of  a  race  that  extends,  not  over 
centuries,  but  thousands  of  centuries ;  how  wide 
must  be  some  of  the  gaps,  how  very  different 
may  the  founders  of  the  family  be  from  their 
descendants  !  The  words  old  and  ancient  that 
we  use  so  often  in  speaking  of  fossils  appeal  to 
us  somewhat  vaguely,  for  we  speak  of  the  an- 
cient civilizations  of  Greece  and  Rome,  and  call 
a  family  old  that  can  show  a  pedigree  running 
back  four  or  five  hundred  years,  when  such  as 
these  are  but  affairs  of  yesterday  compared 
with  even  recent  fossils. 

Perhaps  we  may  better  appreciate  the  mean- 
ing of  these  words  by  recalling  that,  since  the 
dawn  of  vertebrate  life,  sufficient  of  the  earth's 
surface  has  been  worn  away  and  washed  into 
the  sea  to  form,  were  the  strata  piled  directly 
one  upon  the  other,  fifteen  or  twenty  miles  of 
rock.  This,  of  course,  is  the  sum  total  of  sedi- 
mentary rocks,  for  such  a  thickness  as  this  is  not 
to  be  found  at  any  one  locality;  because,  during 
the  various  ups  and  downs  that  this  world  of 


THE   EARLIEST   KNOWN   VERTEBRATES     21 

ours  has  met  with,  those  portions  that  chanced 
to  be  out  of  water  would  receive  no  deposit  of 
mud  or  sand,  and  hence  bear  no  corresponding 
stratum  of  rock.  The  reader  may  think  that 
there  is  a  great  deal  of  difference  between  fif- 
teen and  twenty  miles,  but  this  liberal  margin 
is  due  to  the  difficulty  of  measuring  the  thick- 
ness of  the  rocks,  and  in  Europe  the  sum  of 
the  measurable  strata  is  much  greater  than  in 
North  America. 

The  earliest  traces  of  animal  life  are  found 
deeper  still,  beneath  something  like  eighteen 
to  twenty-five  miles  of  rock,  while  below  this 
level  are  the  strata  in  which  dwelt  the  earliest 
living  things,  organisms  so  small  and  simple 
that  no  trace  of  their  existence  has  been  left, 
and  we  infer  that  they  were  there  because  any 
given  group  starts  in  a  modest  way  with  small 
and  simple  individuals. 

At  the  bottom,  then,  of  twenty  miles  of  rocks 
the  seeker  for  the  progenitor  of  the  great  fam- 
ily of  backboned  animals  finds  the  scant  re- 
mains of  fish-like  animals  that  the  cautious 
naturalist,  who  is  much  given  to  "  hedging," 
terms,  not  vertebrates,  but  pre vertebrates  or 


22  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

the  forerunners  of  backboned  animals.  The 
earliest  of  these  consist  of  small  bony  plates, 
and  traces  of  a  cartilaginous  backbone  from 
the  Lower  Silurian  of  Colorado,  believed  to 
represent  relatives  of  Chimaera  and  species  re- 
lated to  those  better-known  forms  Holopty- 
chius  and  Osteolepis,  which  occur  in  higher 
strata.  There  are  certainly  indications  of  ver- 
tebrate life,  but  the  remains  are  so  imperfect 
that  little  more  can  be  said  regarding  them, 
and  this  is  also  true  of  the  small  conical  teeth 
which  occur  in  the  Lower  Silurian  of  St.  Pe- 
tersburg, and  are  thought  to  be  the  teeth  of 
some  animal  like  the  lamprey. 

A  little  higher  up  in  the  rocks,  though  not 
in  the  scale  of  life,  in  the  Lower  Old  Red  Sand- 
stone of  England,  are  found  more  numerous 
and  better  preserved  specimens  of  another  lit- 
tle fish-like  creature,  rarely  if  ever  exceeding 
two  inches  in  length,  and  also  related  (proba- 
bly) to  the  hag-fishes  and  lampreys  that  live 
to-day. 

These  early  vertebrates  are  not  only  small, 
but  they  were  cartilaginous,  so  that  it  was  es- 
sential for  their  preservation  that  they  should 


THE  EARLIEST   KNOWN   VERTEBRATES     23 

be  buried  in  soft  mud  as  soon  as  possible  after 
death.  Even  if  this  took  place  they  were  later 
on  submitted  to  the  pressure  of  some  miles  of 
overlying  rock  until,  in  some  cases,  their  rer 
mains  have  been  pressed  out  thinner  than  a 
sheet  of  paper,  and  so  thoroughly  incorporated 
into  the  surrounding  stone  that  it  is  no  easy 
matter  to  trace  their  shadowy  outlines.  With 
such  drawbacks  as  these  to  contend  with,  it  can 
scarcely  be  wondered  at  that,  while  some  natu- 
ralists believe  these  little  creatures  to  be  related 
to  the  lamprey,  others  consider  that  they  belong 
to  a  perfectly  distinct  group  of  animals,  and 
others  still  think  it  possible  that  they  may  be 
the  larval  or  early  stages  of  larger  and  better- 
developed  forms. 

Still  higher  up  we  come  upon  the  abundant 
remains  of  numerous  small  fish-like  animals, 
more  or  less  completely  clad  in  bony  armor, 
indicating  that  they  lived  in  troublous  times 
when  there  was  literally  a  fight  for  existence 
and  only  such  as  were  well  armed  or  well 
protected  could  hope  to  survive.  A  parallel 
case  exists  to-day  in  some  of  the  rivers  of  South 
America,  where  the  little  cat-fishes  would  pos- 


24 


ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 


sibly  be  eaten  out  of  existence  but  for  the  fact 
that  they  are  covered  —  some  of  them  very 
completely  —  with  plate -armor  that  enables 
them  to  defy  their  enemies,  or  renders  them 
such  poor  eating  as  not  to  be  worth  the  taking. 


Fig.    4.  —  Cephalaspis  and    Loricaria,  an  Ancient  and  a 
Modern  Armored  Fish. 

The  arrangement  of  the  plates  or  scales  in  the 
living  Loricaria  is  very  suggestive  of  the  series 
of  bony  rings  covering  the  body  of  the  ancient 
Cephalaspis,  only  the  latter,  so  far  as  we  know, 
had  no  side-fins;  but  the  creatures  are  in  no 


THE   EARLIEST    KNOWN    VERTEBRATES     25 

wise  related,  and  the  similarity  is  in  appearance 
only. 

Pterichthys,  the  wing  fish,  was  another  small, 
quaint,  armor-clad  creature,  whose  fossilized  re- 
mains were  taken  for  those  of  a  crab,  and  once 
described  as  belonging  to  a  beetle.  Certainly 
the  buckler  of  this  fish,  which  is  the  part  most 
often  preserved,  with  its  jointed,  bony  arms, 
looks  to  the  untrained  eye  far  more  like  some 
strange  crustacean  than  a  fish,  and  even  natu- 
ralists have  pictured  the  animal  as  crawling 
over  the  bare  sands  by  means  of  those  same 
arms.  These  fishes  and  their  allies  were  once 
the  dominant  type  of  life,  and  must  have 
abounded  in  favored  localities,  for  in  places  are 
great  deposits  of  their  protective  shields  jum- 
bled together  in  a  confused  mass,  and,  save 
that  they  have  hardened  into  stone,  lying  just 
as  they  were  washed  up  on  the  ancient  beach 
ages  ago.  How  abundant  they  were  may  be 
gathered  from  the  fact  that  it  is  believed  their 
bodies  helped  consolidate  portions  of  the  strata 
of  the  English  Old  Red  Sandstone.  Says  Mr. 
Hutchinson,  speaking  of  the  Caithness  Flag- 
stones, "  They  owe  their  peculiar  tenacity  and 


26  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

durability  to  the  dead  fishes  that  rotted  in  their 
midst  while  yet  they  were  only  soft  mud. 
For  just  as  a  plaster  cast  boiled  in  oil  becomes 
thereby  denser  and  more  durable,  so  the  oily 
and  other  matter  coming  from  decomposing 
fish  operated  on  the  surrounding  sand  or  mud 
so  as  to  make  it  more  compact." 

It  may  not  be  easy  to  explain  how  it  came 
to  pass  that  fishes  dwelling  in  salt  water,  as 
these  undoubtedly  did,  were  thus  deposited  in 
great  numbers,  but  we  may  now  and  then  see 
how  deposits  of  fresh-water  fishes  may  have 
been  formed.  When  rivers  flowing  through  a 
stretch  of  level  country  are  swollen  during  the 
spring  floods,  they  overflow  their  banks,  often 
carrying  along  large  numbers  of  fishes.  As  the 
water  subsides  these  may  be  caught  in  shallow 
pools  that  soon  dry  up,  leaving  the  fishes  to 
perish,  and  every  year  the  Illinois  game  asso- 
ciation rescues  from  the  "  back  waters  "  quan- 
tities of  bass  that  would  otherwise  be  lost. 
Mr.  F.  S.  Webster  has  recorded  an  instance 
that  came  under  his  observation  in  Texas, 
where  thousands  of  gar  pikes,  trapped  in  a  lake 
formed  by  an  overflow  of  the  Rio  Grande,  had 


THE   EARLIEST   KNOWN    VERTEBRATES     27 

been,  by  the  drying  up  of  this  lake,  penned  into 
a  pool  about  seventy-five  feet  long  by  twenty- 
five  feet  wide.  The  fish  were  literally  packed 
together  like  sardines,  layer  upon  layer,  and  a 
shot  fired  into  the  pool  would  set  the  entire 
mass  in  motion,  the  larger  gars  as  they  dashed 
about  casting  the  smaller  fry  into  the  air,  a 
score  at  a  time.  Mr.  Webster  estimates  that 
there  must  have  been  not  less  than  700  or  800 
fish  in  the  pool,  from  a  foot  and  a  half  up  to 
seven  feet  in  length,  every  one  of  which  per- 
ished a  little  later.  In  addition  to  the  fish  in 
the  pond,  hundreds  of  those  that  had  died  pre- 
viously lay  about  in  every  direction,  and  one 
can  readily  imagine  what  a  fish-bed  this  would 
have  made  had  the  occurrence  taken  place  in 
the  past. 

From  the  better-preserved  specimens  that  do 
now  and  then  turn  up,  we  are  able  to  obtain  a 
very  exact  idea  of  the  construction  of  the  bony 
cuirass  by  which  Pterichthys  and  its  American 
cousin  were  protected,  and  to  make  a  pretty 
accurate  reconstruction  of  the  entire  animal. 
These  primitive  fishes  had  mouths,  for  eating  is 
a  necessity  ;  but  these  mouths  were  not  associ- 


28  ANIMALS  OF  THE   PAST 

ated  with  true  jaws,  for  the  two  do  not,  as  might 
be  supposed,  necessarily  go  together.  Neither 
did  these  animals  possess  hard  backbones,  and, 
while  Pterichthys  and  its  relatives  had  arms  or, 
fins,  the  hard  parts  of  these  were  not  on  the 
inside  but  on  the  outside,  so  that  the  limb  was 
more  like  the  leg  of  a  crab  than  the  fin  of  a 
fish;  and  this  is  among  the  reasons  why  some 
naturalists  have  been  led  to  conclude  that  ver- 
tebrates may  have  developed  from  crustaceans. 
Pteraspis,  another  of  these  little  armored  pre- 
vertebrates,  had  a  less  complicated  covering, 
and  looked  very  much  like  a  small  fish  with  its 
fore  parts  caught  in  an  elongate  clam-shell. 

The  fishes  that  we  have  so  far  been  consider- 
ing— orphans  of  the  past  they  might  be  termed, 
as  they  have  no  living  relatives — were  little  fel- 
lows ;  but  their  immediate  successors,  preserved 
in  the  Devonian  strata,  particularly  of  North 
America,  were  the  giants  of  those  days,  termed, 
'  from  their  size  and  presumably  fierce  appear- 
ance, Titantichthys  and  Dinichthys,  and  are  re- 
lated to  a  fish,  Ceratodus,  still  living  in  Australia. 

We  know  practically  nothing  of  the  exter- 
nal appearance  of  these  fishes,  great  and  fierce 


THE   EARLIEST    KNOWN    VERTEBRATES     29 

though  they  may  have  been,  with  powerful 
jaws  and  armored  heads,  for  they  had  no  bony 
skeleton — as  if  they  devoted  their  energies  to 
preying  upon  their  neighbors  rather  than  to  in- 
ternal improvements.  They  attained  a  length 
of  ten  to  eighteen  feet,  with  a  gape,  in  the  large 
species  called  Titanichthys,  of  four  feet,  and 
such  a  fish  might  well  be  capable  of  devouring 
anything  known  to  have  lived  at  that  early 
date. 

Succeeding  these,  in  Carboniferous  times, 
came  a  host  of  shark-like  creatures  known 
mainly  from  their  teeth  and  spines,  for  their 
skeletons  were  of  cartilage,  and  belonging  to 
types  that  have  mostly  perished,  giving  place 
to  others  better  adapted  to  the  changed  condi- 
tions wrought  by  time.  Almost  the  only  liv- 
ing relative  of  these  early  fishes  is  a  little  shark, 
known  as  the  Port  Jackson  Shark,  living  in 
Australian  waters.  Like  the  old  sharks,  this 
one  has  a  spine  in  front  of  his  back  fins,  and,  like 
them,  he  fortunately  has  a  mouthful  of  diversely 
shaped  teeth ;  fortunately,  because  through  their 
aid  we  are  enabled  to  form  some  idea  of  the 
manner  in  which  some  of  the  teeth  found  scat- 


30  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

tered  through  the  rocks  were  arranged.  For 
the  teeth  were  not  planted  in  sockets,  as  they 
are  in  higher  animals,  but  simply  rested  on  the 
jaws,  from  which  they  readily  became  detached 
when  decomposition  set  in  after  death.  To 
complicate  matters,  the  teeth  in  different  parts 
of  the  jaws  were  often  so  unlike  one  another 
that  when  found  separately  they  would  hardly 
be  suspected  of  having  belonged  to  the  same 
animal.  Besides  teeth  these  fishes,  for  pur- 
poses of  offence  and  defence,  were  usually  armed 
with  spines,  sometimes  of  considerable  size  and 
strength,  and  often  elaborately  grooved  and 
sculptured.  As  the  soft  parts  perished  the 
teeth  and  spines  were  left  to  be  scattered  by 
waves  and  currents,  a  tooth  here,  another  there, 
and  a  spine  somewhere  else ;  so  it  has  often 
happened  that,  being  found  separately,  two  or 
three  quite  different  names  have  been  given  to 
one  and  the  same  animal.  Now  and  then  some 
specimen  comes  to  light  that  escaped  the 
thousand  and  one  accidents  to  which  such 
things  were  exposed,  and  that  not  only  shows 
the  teeth  and  spines  but  the  faint  imprint  of 
the  body  and  fins  as  well.  And  from  such  rare 


THE  EARLIEST  KNOWN  VERTEBRATES  31 
examples  we  learn  just  what  teeth  and  seines 
go  with  one  another,  and  sometimes  find  that 
one  fish  has  received  names  enough  for  an  en- 
tire school. 

These  ancient  sharks  were  not  the  large  and 
powerful  fishes  that  we  have  to-day  —  these 
came  upon  the  scene  later  —  but  mostly  fishes 
of  small  size,  and,  as  indicated  by  their  spines, 
fitted  quite  as  much  for  defence  as  offence. 
Their  rise  was  rapid,  and  in  their  turn  they 
became  the  masters  of  the  world,  spreading 
in  great  numbers  through  the  waters  that  cov- 
ered the  face  of  the  earth ;  but  their  supremacy 
was  of  short  duration,  for  they  declined  in 
numbers  even  during  the  Carboniferous  Period, 
and  later  dwindled  almost  to  extinction.  And 
while  sharks  again  increased,  they  never  reached 
their  former  abundance,  and  the  species  that 
arose  were  swift,  predatory  forms,  better  fitted 
for  the  struggle  for  existence. 


32  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

REFERENCES 

The  early  Jishes  make  but  little  show  in  a  museum, 
both  on  account  of  their  small  size  and  the  conditions 
under  which  they  have  been  preserved.  The  Museum  of 
Comparative  Zoology  has  a  large  collection  of  these 
ancient  vertebrates,  and  there  is  a  considerable  number  of 
Jine  teeth  and  spines  of  Carboniferous  sharks  in  the 
United  States  National  Museum. 

Hugh  Miller's  "The  Old  Red  Sandstone'1''  contains 
some  charming  descriptions  of  his  discoveries  of  Pterich- 
thys  and  related  forms,  and  this  book  will  ever  remain  a 
classic. 


Fig.  5. —  Pterichthys,  the  Wing  Fish. 


Ill 

IMPRESSIONS  OF  THE  PAST 

"  The  weird  palimpsest,  old  and  vast, 
Wherein  thou  hid'st  the  spectral  past." 

The  Rev.  H.  N.  Hutchinson  commences  one 
of  his  interesting  books  with  Emerson's  say- 
ing, "  that  Everything  in  nature  is  engaged  in 
writing  its  own  history;"  and,  as  this  remark 
cannot  be  improved  on,  it  may  well  stand  at 
the  head  of  a  chapter  dealing  with  the  foot- 
prints that  the  creatures  of  yore  left  on  the 
sands  of  the  sea-shore,  the  mud  of  a  long- van- 
ished lake  bottom,  or  the  shrunken  bed  of  some 
water- course.  Not  only  have  creatures  that 
walked  left  a  record  of  their  progress,  but  the 
worms  that  burrowed  in  the  sand,  the  shell-fish 
that  trailed  over  the  mud  when  the  tide  was 
low,  the  stranded  crab  as  he  scuttled  back  to 
the  sea  —  each  and  all  left  some  mark  to  tell 
of  their  former  presence.  Even  the  rain  that  fell 


34  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

and  the  very  wind  that  blew  sometimes  re- 
corded the  direction  whence,  they  came,  and 
we  may  read  in  the  rocks,  also,  accounts  of 
freshets  sweeping  down  with  turbid  waters,  and 
of  long  periods  of  drouth,  when  the  land  was 
parched  and  lakes  and  rivers  shrank  beneath 
the  burning  sun. 

All  these  things  have  been  told  and  retold  ; 
but,  as  there  are  many  who  have  not  read 
Mr.  Hutchinson's  books  and  to  whom  Buck- 
land  is  quite  unknown,  it  may  be  excusable 
to  add  something  to  what  has  already  been 
said  in  the  first  chapter  of  these  impressions 
of  the  past. 

The  very  earliest  suggestion  we  have  of  the 
presence  of  animal  life  upon  this  globe  is  in 
the  form  of  certain  long  dark  streaks  below 
the  Cambrian  of  England,  considered  to  be 
traces  of  the  burrows  of  worms  that  were  filled 
with  fine  mud,  and  while  this  interpretation 
may  be  wrong  there  is,  on  the  other  hand,  no 
reason  why  it  may  not  be  correct.  Plant  and 
animal  life  must  have  had  very  lowly  begin- 
nings, and  it  is  not  at  all  probable  that  we 
shall  find  any  trace  of  the  simple  and  minute 


IMPRESSIONS   OF   THE   PAST  35 

forms  with  which  they  started,*  though  we 
should  not  be  surprised  at  finding  hints  of  the 
presence  of  living  creatures  below  the  strata 
in  which  their  remains  are  actually  known  to 
occur. 

Worm  burrows,  to  be  sure,  are  hardly  foot- 
prints, but  tracks  are  found  in  Cambrian  rocks 
just  above  the  strata  in  which  the  supposed 
burrows  occur,  and  from  that  time  onward 
there  are  tracks  a-plenty,  for  they  have  been 
made,  wherever  the  conditions  were  favorable, 
ever  since  animals  began  to  walk.  All  that 
was  needed  was  a  medium  in  which  impres- 
sions could  be  made  and  so  filled  that  there 
was  imperfect  adhesion  between  mould  and 
matrix.  Thus  we  find  them  formed  not  only 
by  the  sea-shore,  in  sands  alternately  dry  and 
covered,  but  by  the  river-side,  in  shallow  water, 
or  even  on  land  where  tracks  might  be  left  in 

*  Within  the  last  Jew  years  rvhat  are  believed  to  be  indica- 
tions of  bacteria  have  been  described  from  carboniferous  rocks. 
Naturally  such  announcements  must  be  accepted  with  great 
caution,  for  while  there  is  no  reason  why  this  may  not  be  true, 
it  is  much  more  probable  that  definite  evidence  of  the  effects  of 
bacteria  on  plants  should  be  found  than  that  these  simple,  single- 
celled  organisms  should  themselves  have  been  detected. 


36  ANIMALS  OF  THE   PAST 

soft  or  moist  earth  into  which  wind-driven 
dust  or  sand  might  lodge,  or  sand  or  mud  be 
swept  by  the  mimic  flood  caused  by  a  thunder 
shower. 

So  there  are  tracks  in  strata  of  every  age ; 
at  first  those  of  invertebrates :  after  the  worm 
burrows  the  curious  complicated  trails  of  ani- 
mals believed  to  be  akin  to  the  king  crab ; 
broad,  ribbed,  ribbon-like  paths  ascribed  to 
trilobites ;  then  faint  scratches  of  insects,  and 
the  shallow,  palmed  prints  of  salamanders,  and 
the  occasional  slender  sprawl  of  a  lizard  ;  then 
footprints,  big  and  little,  of  the  horde  of  Di- 
nosaurs and,  finally,  miles  above  the  Cambri- 
an, marks  of  mammals.  Sometimes,  like  the 
tracks  of  salamanders  and  reptiles  in  the  car- 
boniferous rocks  of  Pennsylvania  and  Kansas, 
these  are  all  we  have  to  tell  of  the  existence 
of  air-breathing  animals.  Again,  as  with  the 
iguanodon,  the  foot  to  fit  the  track  may  be 
found  in  the  same  layer  of  rock,  but  this  is  not 
often  the  case. 

Although  footprints  in  the  rocks  must  often 
have  been  seen,  they  seem  to  have  attracted  lit- 
tle or  no  notice  from  scientific  men  until  about 


IMPRESSIONS   OF  THE   PAST  37 

1830  to  1835,  when  they  were  almost  simul- 
taneously described  both  in  Europe  and  Amer- 
ica ;  even  then,  it  was  some  time  before  they 
were  generally  conceded  to  be  actually  the 
tracks  of  animals,  but,  like  worm  burrows  and 
trails,  were  looked  upon  as  the  impressions  of 
sea-weeds. 

The  now  famous  tracks  in  the  "  brown 
stone"  of  the  Connecticut  Valley  seem  to  have 
first  been  seen  by  Pliny  Moody  in  1802,  when 
he  ploughed  up  a  specimen  on  his  farm,  show- 
ing small  imprints,  which  later  on  were  popu- 
larly called  the  tracks  of  Noah's  raven.  The 
discovery  passed  without  remark  until  in  1835 
the  footprints  came  under  the  observation  of 
Dr.  James  Deane,  who,  in  turn,  called  Professor 
Hitchcock's  attention  to  them.  The  latter  at 
once  began  a  systematic  study  of  these  im- 
pressions, publishing  his  first  account  in  1836 
and  continuing  his  researches  for  many  years, 
in  the  course  of  which  he  brought  together  the 
fine  collection  in  Amherst  College.  At  that 
time  Dinosaurs  were  practically  unknown,  and 
it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  these  three- 
toed  tracks,  great  and  small,  were  almost  uni- 


38 

versally  believed  to  be  those  of  birds.  So  it  is 
greatly  to  the  credit  of  Dr.  Deane,  who  also 
studied  these  footprints,  that  he  was  led  to 
suspect  that  they  might  have  been  made  by 
other  animals.  This  suspicion  was  partly 
caused  by  the  occasional  association  of  four 
and  five-toed  prints  with  the  three-toed  im- 
pressions, and  partly  by  the  rare  occurrence  of 


Fig.  6.  —  Where  a  Dinosaur  Sat  Down. 

imprints  showing  the  texture  of  the  sole  of  the 
foot,  which  was  quite  different  from  that  of 
any  known  bird. 

In  the  light  of  our  present  knowledge  we 
are  able  to  read  many  things  in  these  tracks 
that  were  formerly  more  or  less  obscure,  and 
to  see  in  them  a  complete  verification  of  Dr. 
Deane's  suspicion  that  they  were  not  made  by 
birds.  We  see  clearly  that  the  long  tracks 


IMPRESSIONS   OB/ THE    PAST  39 

called  Anomcepus,  witl/  their  accompanying 
short  fore  feet,  mark  where  some  Dinosaur 
squatted  down  to  rest  or  progressed  slowly  on 
all-fours,  as  does  the  kangaroo  when  feeding 
quietly;*  and  we  interpret  the  curious  heart- 
shaped  depression  sometimes  seen  back  of  the 
feet,  not  as  the  mark  of  a  stubby  tail,  but  as 
made  by  the  ends  of  the  slender  pubes,  bones 
that  help  form  the  hip-joints.  Then,  too,  the 
mark  of  the  inner,  or  short  first,  toe,  is  often 
very  evident,  although  it  was  a  long  time  be- 
fore the  bones  of  this  toe  were  actually  found, 
and  many  of  the  Dinosaurs  now  known  to 
have  four  toes  were  supposed  to  have  but 
three. 

It  seems  strange,  and  it  is  strange,  that 
while  so  many  hundreds  of  tracks  should  have 
been  found  in  the  limited  area  exposed  to  view, 
so  few  bones  have  been  found  —  our  knowledge 
of  the  veritable  animals  that  made  the  tracks 

*  It  is  to  be  noted  that  a  leaping  kangaroo  touches  the 
ground  neither  with  his  heel  nor  his  tail,  but  that  between 
jumps  he  rests  momentarily  on  his  toes  only ;  hence  impres- 
sions made  by  any  creature  that  jumped  like  a  kangaroo  would 
be  very  short. 


40  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

being  a  blank.  A  few  examples  have,  it  is 
true,  been  found,  but  these  are  only  a 'tithe  of 
those  known  to  have  existed  ;  while  of  the  great 
animals  that  strode  along  the  shore,  leaving 
tracks  fifteen  inches  long  and  a  yard  apart 
pressed  deeply  into  the  hard  sand,  not  a  bone 
remains.  The  probability  is  that  the  strata 
containing  their  bones  lie  out  to  sea,  whither 
their  bodies  were  carried  by  tides  and  currents, 
and  that  we  may  never  see  more  than  the  few 
fragments  that  were  scattered  along  the  sea- 
side. 

That  part  of  the  Valley  of  the  Connecticut 
wherein  the  footprints  are  found  seems  to  have 
been  a  long,  narrow  estuary  running  south- 
ward from  Turner's  Falls,  Mass.,  where  the 
tracks  are  most  abundant  and  most  clear. 
The  topography  was  such  that  this  estuary 
was  subject  to  sudden  and  great  fluctuations  of 
the  water-level,  large  tracts  of  shore  being  now 
left  dry  to  bake  in  the  sun,  and  again  covered 
by  turbid  water  which  deposited  on  the  bot- 
tom a  layer  of  mud.  Over  and  over  again  this 
happened,  forming  layer  upon  layer  of  what  is 
now  stone,  sometimes  the  lapse  of  time  be- 


-•^  %  & l 


'fci-% 


IMPRESSIONS    OF   THE    PAST  41 

tween  the  deposits  being  so  short  that  the 
tracks  of  the  big  Dinosaurs  extend  through 
several  sheets  of  stone ;  while  again  there  was  a 
period  of  drouth  when  the  shore  became  so  dry 
and  firm  as  to  retain  but  a  single  shallow  im- 
pression. 

Something  of  the  wealth  of  animal  life  that 
roamed  about  this  estuary  may  be  gathered 
from  the  number  of  different  footprints  re- 
corded on  the  sands,  and  these  are  so  many  and 
so  varied  that  Professor  Hitchcock  in  two  ex- 
tensive reports  enumerated  over  150  species, 
representing  various  groups  of  animals.  One 
little  point  must,  however,  be  borne  in  mind, 
that  mere  size  is  no  sure  indication  of  differ- 
ences in  dealing  with  reptiles,  for  these  long- 
lived  creatures  grow  almost  continuously 
throughout  life,  so  that  one  animal  even  may 
have  left  his  footprints  over  and  over  in  as- 
sorted sizes  from  one  end  of  the  valley  to  the 
other. 

The  slab  shown  in  Fig.  7  is  a  remarkably 
fine  example  of  these  Connecticut  River  foot- 
prints; it  shows  in  relief  forty-eight  tracks  of 
the  animal  called  Brontozoum  sillimanium  and 


42  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

six  of  a  lesser  species.  It  was  quarried  near 
Middletown,  in  1778,  and  for  sixty  years  did 
duty  as  a  flagstone,  fortunately  with  the  face 
downwards.  When  taken  up  for  repairs  the 
tracks  were  discovered,  and  later  on  the  slab, 
which  measures  three  by  five  feet,  was  trans- 
ferred to  the  museum  of  Amherst  College. 

There  is  an  interesting  parallel  between  the 
history  of  footprints  in  England  and  America, 
for  they  were  noticed  at  about  the  same  time, 
1830,  in  both  countries;  in  each  case  the  tracks 
were  in  rocks  of  Triassic  age,  and,  in  both  in- 
stances, the  animals  that  made  them  have 
never  been  found.  In  England,  however,  the 
tracks  first  found  were  those  ascribed  to  tor- 
toises, though  a  little  later  Dinosaur  footprints 
were  discovered  in  the  same  locality.  Oddly 
enough  these  numerous  tracks  all  run  one 
way,  from  west  to  east,  as  if  the  animals  were 
migrating,  or  were  pursuing  some  well-known 
and  customary  route  to  their  feeding  grounds. 

For  some  reason  Triassic  rocks  are  particu- 
larly rich  in  footprints  ;  for  from  strata  of  this 
same  age  in  the  Rhine  Valley  come  those  cu- 
rious examples  so  like  the  mark  of  a  stubby 


IMPRESSIONS    OF   THE   PAST  43 

hand  that  Dr.  Kaup  christened  the  beast  sup- 
posed to  have  made  them  Cheirotherium,  beast 
with  a  hand,  suggesting  that  they  had  been 
made  by  some  gigantic  opossum.  As  the 
tracks  measure  five  by  eight  inches,  it  would 
have  been  rather  a  large  specimen,  but  the 
mammals  had  not  then  arisen,  and  it  is  gener- 
ally believed  that  the  impressions  were  made 
by  huge  (for  their  kind)  salamander-like  creat- 
ures, known  as  labyrinthodonts,  whose  re- 
mains are  found  in  the  same  strata. 

Footprints  may  aid  greatly  in  determining 
the  attitude  assumed  by  extinct  animals,  and 
in  this  way  they  have  been  of  great  service  in 
furnishing  proof  that  many  of  the  Dinosaurs 
walked  erect.  The  impressions  on  the  sands 
of  the  old  Connecticut  estuary  may  be  said  to 
show  this  very  plainly,  but  in  England  and 
Belgium  is  evidence  still  more  conclusive,  in 
the  shape  of  tracks  ascribed  to  the  Iguanodon. 
These  were  made  on  soft  soil  into  which  the 
feet  sank  much  more  deeply  than  in  the  Con- 
necticut sands,  and  the  casts  made  in  the  nat- 
ural moulds  show  the  impression  of  toes  very 
clearly.  If  the  animals  had  walked  flat-footed, 


44  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

as  we  do,  the  prints  of  the  toes  would  have 
been  followed  by  a  long  heel  mark,  but  such 
is  not  the  case ;  there  are  the  sharply  defined 
marks  of  the  toes  and  nothing  more,  showing 
plainly  that  the  Iguanodons  walked,  like  birds, 
on  the  toes  alone.  More  than  this,  had  these 
Dinosaurs  dragged  their  tails  there  would  have 
been  a  continuous  furrow  between  the  foot- 
prints ;  but  nothing  of  this  sort  is  to  be  found  ; 
on  the  contrary,  a  fine  series  of  tracks,  uncov- 
ered at  Hastings,  England,  made  by  several 
individuals  and  running  for  seventy-five  feet, 
shows  footprints  only.  Hence  it  may  be  fairly 
concluded  that  these  great  creatures  carried 
their  tails  clear  of  the  ground,  as  shown  in  the 
picture  of  Thespesius,  the  weight  of  the  tail 
counterbalancing  that  of  the  body.  Where 
crocodilians  or  some  of  the  short-limbed  Di- 
nosaurs have  crept  along  there  is,  as  we  should 
expect,  a  continuous  furrow  between  the  im- 
prints of  the  feet.  This  is  what  footprints  tell 
us  when  their  message  is  read  aright;  when 
improperly  translated  they  only  add  to  the 
enormous  bulk  of  our  ignorance. 

Some  years  ago  we  were  treated  to  accounts 


IMPRESSIO:  AST  45 

of  wonderful  footprin  in  the  rock  of  the 
prison-yard  at  Cars<  ,  which,  ac- 

cording to  the  pape  ihowed  that 

men  existed  at  a  mu  od  than  the 

scientific  supposed,  but  that  they  were  men 
of  giant  stature.  1  was  cl«. .  rly  demon- 
strated by  the  footpri  ;,  for  they  were  such  as 
might  have  been  ma  Je  by  huge  moccasined 
feet,  and  this  was  all  that  was  necessary  for 
the  conclusion  that  they  were  made  by  just 
such  feet.  For  it  is  a  curious  fact  that  the 
majority  of  mankind  seem  to  prefer  any  ex- 
planation other  than  the  most  simple  and  nat- 
ural, particularly  in  the  case  of  fossils,  and  are 
always  looking  for  a  primitive  race  of  gigantic 
men. 

Bones  of  the  Mastodon  and  Mammoth  have 
again  and  again  been  eagerly  accepted  as  those 
of  giants ;  a  salamander  was  brought  forward 
as  evidence  of  the  deluge  (homo  diluvii  testis); 
ammonites  and  their  allies  pose  as  fossil  snakes, 
and  the  "petrified  man"  flourishes  perennially. 
However,  in  this  case  the  prints  were  recog- 
nized by  naturalists  as  having  most  probably 
been  made  by  some  great  ground  sloth,  such 


46  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

as  the  Mylodon  or  Morotherium,  these  ani- 
mals, though  belonging  to  a  group  whose  head- 
quarters were  in  Patagonia,  having  extended 
their  range  as  far  north  as  Oregon.  That  the 
tracks  seemed  to  have  been  made  by  a  biped, 
rather  than  a  quadruped,  was  due  to  the  fact 
that  the  prints  of  the  hind  feet  fell  upon  and 
obliterated  the  marks  of  the  fore.  Still,  a  little 
observation  showed  that  here  and  there  prints 
of  the  fore  feet  were  to  be  seen,  and  on  one 
spot  were  indications  of  a  struggle  between 
two  of  the  big  beasts.  The  mud,  or  rather 
the  stone  that  had  been  mud,  bears  the  im- 
prints of  opposing  feet,  one  set  deeper  at  the 
toes,  the  other  at  the  heels,  as  if  one  animal 
had  pushed  and  the  other  resisted.  In  the 
rock,  too,  are  broad  depressions  bearing  the 
marks  of  coarse  hair,  where  one  creature  had 
apparently  sat  on  its  haunches  in  order  to  use 
its  fore  limbs  to  the  best  advantage.  Other 
footprints  there  are  in  this  prison-yard ;  the 
great  round  "  spoor "  of  the  mammoth,  the 
hoofs  of  a  deer,  and  the  paws  of  a  wolf  (?),  indi- 
cating that  hereabout  was  some  pool  where  all 
these  creatures  came  to  drink.  More  than  this. 


IMPRESSIONS   OF   THE   PAST  47 

we  learn  that  when  these  prints  were  made,  or 
shortly  after,  a  strong  wind  blew  from  the 
southeast,  for  on  that  face  of  the  ridges  bound- 
ing the  margin  of  each  big  footprint,  we  find 
sand  that  lodged  against  the  squeezed-up  mud 
and  stuck  there  to  serve  as  a  perpetual  record 
of  the  direction  of  the  wind. 

REFERENCES 

Almost  every  museum  has  some  specimen  of  the  Con- 
necticut Valley  footprints,  but  the  largest  and  finest  col- 
lections are  in  the  museums  of  Amherst  College,  Mass., 
and  Yale  University,  although,  owing  to  lack  of  room, 
only  a  few  of  the  Yale  specimens  are  on  exhibition. 
The  collection  at  Amherst  comprises  most  of  the  types 
described  by  Professor  E.  Hitchcock  in  his  "Ichnology  of 
New  England,"  a  work  in  two  fully  illustrated  quarto 
•volumes.  Other  footprints  are  described  and  figured  by 
Dr.  J.  Deane  in  "Ichnographs  from  the  Sandstone  of 
the  Connecticut  River." 


Fig.  8.  —  The  Track  of  a  Three-toed  Dinosaur. 


IV 

RULERS  OF  THE  ANCIENT  SEAS 

"A  time  there  was  when  the  universe  was  darkness  and 
water,  wherein  certain  animals  of  frightful  and  compound 
mien  were  generated.  There  were  serpents,  and  other  creatures 
with  the  mixed  shapes  of  one  another.  .  .  ." — The  Archaic 
Genesis. 

History  shows  us  how  in  the  past  nation  after 
nation  has  arisen,  increased  in  size  and  strength, 
extended  its  bounds  and  dominion  until  it  be- 
came the  ruling  power  of  the  world,  and  then 
passed  out  of  existence,  often  so  completely 
that  nothing  has  remained  save  a  few  mounds 
of  dirt  marking  the  graves  of  former  cities. 
And  so  has  it  been  with  the  kingdoms  of 
nature.  Just  as  Greece,  Carthage,  and  Rome 
were  successively  the  rulers  of  the  sea  in  the 
days  that  we  call  old,  so,  long  before  the  advent 
of  man,  the  seas  were  ruled  by  successive  races 
of  creatures  whose  bones  now  lie  scattered 
over  the  beds  of  the  ancient  seas,  even  as  the 

48 


RULERS   OF   THE   ANCIENT  SEAS  49 

wrecks  of  galleys  lie  strewn  over  the  bed  of 
the  Mediterranean.  For  a  time  the  armor- 
clad  fishes  held  undisputed  sway ;  then  their 
reign  was  ended  by  the  coming  of  the  sharks, 
who  in  their  turn  gave  way  to  the  fish-lizards, 
the  Ichthyosaurs  and  Plesiosaurs.  These,  how- 
ever, were  rather  local  in  their  rule ;  but  the 
next  group  of  reptiles  to  appear  on  the  scene, 
the  great  marine  reptiles  called  Mosasaurs, 
practically  extended  their  empire  around  the 
world,  from  New  Zealand  to  North  America. 

We  properly  call  these  reptiles  great,  for  so 
they  were  ;  but  there  are  degrees  of  greatness, 
and  there  is  a  universal  tendency  to  think  of 
the  animals  that  have  become  extinct  as  much 
greater  than  those  of  the  present  day,  to  mag- 
nify the  reptile  that  we  never  saw  as  well  as 
the  fish  that  "  got  away,"  and  it  may  be  safely 
said  that  the  greatest  of  animals  will  shrink 
before  a  two-foot  rule.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
no  animals  are  known  to  have  existed  that 
were  larger  than  the  whales  ;  and,  while  there 
are  now  no  reptiles  that  can  compare  in  bulk 
with  the  Dinosaurs,  there  were  few  Mosasaurs 
that  exceeded  in  size  a  first-class  Crocodile. 


50  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

An  occasional  Mosasaur  reaches  a  length  of 
forty  feet,  but  such  are  rare  indeed,  and  one 
even  twenty-five  feet  long  is  a  large  specimen,* 
while  the  great  Mugger,  or  Man-eating  Croco- 
dile, grows,  if  permitted,  to  a  length  of  twenty- 
five  or  even  thirty  feet,  and  need  not  be 
ashamed  to  match  his  bulk  and  jaws  against 
those  of  most  Mosasaurs. 

The  first  of  these  sea-reptiles  to  be  dis- 
covered has  passed  into  history,  and  now 
reposes  in  the  Jardin  des  Plantes,  Paris, 
after  changing  hands  two  or  three  times, 
the  original  owner  being  dispossessed  of  his 
treasure  by  the  subtleties  of  law,  while  the 
next  holder  was  deprived  of  the  specimen 
by  main  force.  Thus  the  story  is  told  by 
M.  Faujas  St.  Fond,  as  rendered  into  English, 
in  Mantell's  "  Petrifactions  and  their  Teach- 
ings " :  "  Some  workmen,  in  blasting  the  rock 

*  It  is  surprising  to  find  Professor  Cope  placing  the  length 
of  the  Mosasaurs  at  70,  80,  or  100  feet,  as  there  is  not  the 
slightest  basis  for  even  the  lowest  of  these  figures.  Professor 
Williston,  the  best  authority  on  the  subject,  states,  in  his  volume 
on  the  "Cretaceous  Reptiles  of  Kansas,"  that  there  is  not  in  ex- 
istence any  specimen  of  a  Mosasaur  indicating  a  greater  length 
than  45  feet. 


RULERS   OF  THE   ANCIENT   SEAS          51 

in  one  of  the  caverns  of  the  interior  of  the 
mountain,  perceived,  to  their  astonishment,  the 
jaws  of  a  large  animal  attached  to  the  roof  of 
the  chasm.  The  discovery  was  immediately 
made  known  to  M.  Hoffman,  who  repaired  to 
the  spot,  and  for  weeks  presided  over  the  ardu- 
ous task  of  separating  the  mass  of  stone  con- 
taining these  remains  from  the  surrounding 
rock.  His  labors  were  rewarded  by  the  suc- 
cessful extrication  of  the  specimen,  which  he 
conveyed  in  triumph  to  his  house.  This  ex- 
traordinary discovery,  however,  soon  became 
the  subject  of  general  conversation,  and  excited 
so  much  interest  that  the  canon  of  the  cathedral 
which  stands  on  the  mountain  resolved  to  claim 
the  fossil,  in  right  of  being  lord  of  the  manor, 
and  succeeded,  after  a  long  and  harassing  law- 
suit, in  obtaining  the  precious  relic.  It  re- 
mained for  years  in  his  possession,  and  Hoff- 
man died  without  regaining  his  treasure.  At 
length  the  French  Revolution  broke  out,  and 
the  armies  of  the  Republic  advanced  to  the 
gates  of  Maestricht.  The  town  was  bom- 
barded ;  but,  at  the  suggestion  of  the  commit- 
tee of  savans  who  accompanied  the  French 


52  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

troops  to  select  their  share  of  the  plunder,  the 
artillery  was  not  suffered  to  play  on  that  part 
of  the  city  in  which  the  celebrated  fossil  was 
known  to  be  preserved.  In  the  meantime,  the 
canon  of  St.  Peter's,  shrewdly  suspecting  the 
reason  why  such  peculiar  favor  was  shown  to 
his  residence,  removed  the  specimen  and  con- 
cealed it  in  a  vault ;  but,  when  the  city  was 
taken,  the  French  authorities  compelled  him 
to  give  up  his  ill-gotten  prize,  which  was 
immediately  transmitted  to  the  Jardin  des 
Plantes,  at  Paris,  where  it  still  forms  one  of 
the  most  interesting  objects  in  that  magnifi- 
cent collection."  And  there  it  remains  to 
this  day. 

The  seas  that  rolled  over  western  Kansas 
were  the  headquarters  of  the  Mosasaurs,  and 
hundreds  —  aye,  thousands  —  of  specimens 
have  been  taken  from  the  chalk  bluffs  of  that 
region,  some  of  them  in  such  a  fine  state  of 
preservation  that  we  are  not  only  well  ac- 
quainted with  their  internal  structure,  but  with 
their  outward  appearance  as  well.  They  were 
essentially  swimming  lizards  —  great,  over- 
grown, and  distant  relatives  of  the  Monitors 


Fig.   9- — A  Great  Sea  Lizard,   Tylosaurns  Dyspelor, 
From  a  drawing  by  J.  M.  Gleeson. 


RULERS   OF  THE   ANCIENT   SEAS  53 

of  Africa  and  Asia,  especially  adapted  to  a 
roving,  predatory  life  by  their  powerful  tails 
and  paddle-shaped  feet.  Their  cup-and-ball 
vertebrae  indicate  great  flexibility  of  the  body, 
their  sharp  teeth  denote  ability  to  capture  slip- 
pery prey,  and  the  structure  of  the  lower  jaw 
shows  that  they  probably  ate  in  a  hurry  and 
swallowed  their  food  entire,  or  bolted  it  in 
great  chunks.  The  jaws  of  all  reptiles  are 
made  up  of  a  number  of  pieces,  but  these  are 
usually  so  spliced  together  that  each  half  of  the 
jaw  is  one  inflexible,  or  nearly  inflexible,  mass 
of  bone.  In  snakes,  which  swallow  their  prey 
entire,  the  difficulty  of  swallowing  animals 
greater  in  diameter  than  themselves  is  sur- 
mounted by  having  the  two  halves  of  the  lowei 
jaw  loosely  joined  at  the  free  ends,  so  that 
these  may  spread  wide  apart  and  thus  increase 
the  gape  of  the  mouth.  This  is  also  helped  by 
the  manner  in  which  the  jaw  is  joined  to  the 
head.  The  pelican  solves  the  problem  by  the 
length  of  his  mandibles,  this  allowing  so  much 
spring  that  when  open  they  bow  apart  to 
form  a  nice  little  landing  net.  In  the  Mosa- 
saurs,  as  in  the  cormorants,  among  birds,  there 


54  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

is  a  sort  of  joint  in  each  half  of  the  lower  jaw 
which  permits  it  to  bow  outward  when  opened, 
and  this,  aided  by  the  articulation  of  the  jaw 
with  the  cranium,  adds  greatly  to  the  swallow- 
ing capacity.  Thus  in  nature  the  same  end  is 
attained  by  very  different  methods.  To  bor- 
row a  suggestion  from  Professor  Cope,  if  the 
reader  will  extend  his  arms  at  full  length,  the 
palms  touching,  and  then  bend  his  elbows  out- 
ward he  will  get  a  very  good  idea  of  the  ac- 


Fig.   10. — Jaw  of  a   Mosasaur,  Showing   the   Joint   that 
Increased  the  Swallowing  Capacity  of  that  Reptile. 

tion  of  a  Mosasaur's  jaw.  The  western  sea 
was  a  lively  place  in  the  day  of  the  great 
Mosasaurs,  for  with  them  swam  the  king  of 
turtles,  Archelon,  as  Mr.  Wieland  has  fitly 
named  him,  a  creature  a  dozen  feet  or  more  in 
length,  with  a  head  a  full  yard  long,  while  in 
the  shallows  prowled  great  fishes  with  massive 
jaws  and  teeth  like  spikes. 

There,  too,  was  the  great,  toothed   diver, 


RULERS  OF  THE  ANCIENT  SEAS  55 

Hesperornis  (see  page  83),  while  over  the 
waters  flew  pterodactyls,  with  a  spread  of 
wing  of  twenty  feet,  largest  of  all  flying 
creatures  ;  and,  not  improbably  —  nay,  very 
probably — fish-eaters,  too  ;  and  when  each  and 
all  of  these  were  seeking  their  dinners,  there 
were  troublous  times  for  the  small  fry  in  that 
old  Kansan  sea. 

And  then  there  came  a  change ;  to  the 
south,  to  the  west,  to  the  north,  the  land  was 
imperceptibly  but  surely  rising,  perhaps  only 
an  inch  or  two  in  a  century,  but  still  rising, 
until  "  The  Ocean  in  which  flourished  this 
abundant  and  vigorous  life  was  at  last  com- 
pletely inclosed  on  the  west  by  elevations  of 
sea-bottom,  so  that  it  only  communicated  with 
the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  at  the  Gulf  of  Mexico 
and  the  Arctic  Sea." 

The  continued  elevation  of  both  eastern  and 
western  shores  contracted  its  area,  and  when 
ridges  of  the  sea-bottom  reached  the  surface, 
forming  long,  low  bars,  parts  of  the  water-area 
were  included,  and  connection  with  salt-water 
prevented.  Thus  were  the  living  beings  im- 
prisoned and  subjected  to  many  new  risks  to 


56  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

life.  The  stronger  could  more  readily  capture 
the  weaker,  while  the  fishes  would  gradually 
perish  through  the  constant  freshening  of  the 
water.  With  the  death  of  any  considerable 
class,  the  balance  of  food-supply  would  be  lost, 
and  many  large  species  would  disappear  from 
the  scene.  The  most  omnivorous  and  enduring 
would  longest  resist  the  approach  of  starvation, 
but  would  finally  yield  to  inexorable  fate  —  the 
last  one  caught  by  the  shifting  bottom  among 
shallow  pools,  from  which  his  exhausted  ener- 
gies could  not  extricate  him."  * 

Like  the  "Fossil  man"  the  sea-serpent 
flourishes  perennially  in  the  newspapers  and, 
despite  the  fact  that  he  is  now  mainly  regarded 
as  a  joke,  there  have  been  many  attempts  to 
habilitate  this  mythical  monster  and  place  him 
on  a  foundation  of  firm  fact.  The  most  earn- 
est of  these  was  that  of  M.  Oudemans,  who 
expressed  his  belief  in  the  existence  of  some 
rare  and  huge  seal-like  creature  whose  occa- 
sional appearance  in  southern  waters  gave  rise 

*  Cope:  "  The  Vertebrata  of  the  Cretaceous  Formations  of 
the  West"  p.  50,  being  the  "Report  of  the  United  States  Geo- 
logical Survey  of  the  Territories,"  Vol.  II. 


RULERS   OF   THE   ANCIENT   SEAS  57 

to  the  best  authenticated  reports  of  the  sea- 
serpent.  Among  other  possibilities  it  has  been 
suggested  that  some  animal  believed  to  be  ex- 
tinct had  really  lived  over  to  the  present  day. 
Now  there  are  a  few  waifs,  spared  from  the 
wrecks  of  ancient  faunas,  stranded  on  the 
shores  of  the  present,  such  as  the  Australian 
Ceratodus  and  the  Gar  Pikes  of  North  Amer- 
ica, and  these  and  all  other  creatures  that  could 
be  mustered  in  were  used  as  proofs  to  sustain 
this  theory.  If,  it  was  said,  these  animals 
have  been  spared,  why  not  others?  If  a  fish 
of  such  ancient  lineage  as  the  Gar  Pike  is  so 
common  as  to  be  a  nuisance,  why  may  there 
not  be  a  few  Plesiosaurs  or  a  Mosasaur  some- 
where in  the  depths  of  the  ocean  ?  The  argu- 
ment was  a  good  one,  the  more  that  we  may 
"suppose"  almost  anything,  but  it  must  be 
said  that  no  trace  of  any  of  these  creatures  has 
so  far  been  found  outside  of  the  strata  in  which 
they  have  long  been  known  to  occur,  and  all 
the  probabilities  are  opposed  to  this  theory. 
Still,  if  some  of  these  creatures  had  been  spared, 
they  might  well  have  passed  for  sea-serpents, 
even  though  Zeuglodon,  the  one  most  like  a 


58  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

serpent  in  form,  was  the  one  most  remotely  re- 
lated to  snakes. 

Zeuglodon,  the  yoke-tooth,  so  named  from 
the  shape  of  its  great  cutting  teeth,  was  in- 
deed a  strange  animal,  and  if  we  wonder  at 
the  Greenland  Whale,  whose  head  is  one-third 
its  total  length,  we  may  equally  wonder  at 
Zeuglodon,  with  four  feet  of  head,  ten  feet  of 
body,  and  forty  feet  of  tail.  No  one,  seeing 
the  bones  of  the  trunk  and  tail  for  the  first 
time,  would  suspect  that  they  belonged  to  the 
same  animal,  for  while  the  vertebra*  of  the 
body  are  of  moderate  size,  those  of  the  tail 
are,  for  the  bulk  of  creature,  the  longest 
known,  measuring  from  fifteen  to  eighteen 
inches  in  length,  and  weighing  in  a  fossil  con- 
dition fifty  to  sixty  pounds.  In  life,  the  ani- 
mal was  from  fifty  to  seventy  feet  in  length, 
and  not  more  than  six  or  eight  feet  through 
the  deepest  part  of  the  body,  while  the  tail 
was  much  less;  the  head  was  small  and 
pointed,  the  jaws  well  armed  with  grasping 
and  cutting  teeth,  and  just  back  of  the  head 
was  a  pair  of  short  paddles,  not  unlike  those 
of  a  fur  seal.  It  is  curious  to  speculate  on 


RULERS   OF  THE   ANCIENT   SEAS  59 

\he  habits  of  a  creature  in  which  the  tail  so 
obviously  wagged  the  dog  and  whose  articula- 
tions all  point  to  great  freedom  of  movement 
up  and  down.  This  may  mean  that  it  was  an 
active  diver,  descending  to  great  depths  to 
prey  upon  squid,  as  the  Sperm- Whale  does 
to-day,  while  it  seems  quite  certain  that  it 
must  have  reared  at  least  a  third  of  its  great 
length  out  of  water  to  take  a  comprehensive 
view  of  its  surroundings.  And  if  size  is  any 
indication  of  power,  the  great  tail,  which  ob- 
viously ended  in  flukes  like  those  of  a  whale, 
must  have  been  capable  of  propelling  the  beast 
at  a  speed  of  twenty  or  thirty  miles  an  hour. 
Something  of  the  kind  must  have  been  needed 
in  order  that  the  small  head  might  provide  food 
enough  for  the  great  tail,  and  it  has  been  sug- 
gested that  inability  to  do  this  was  the  reason 
why  Zeuglodon  became  extinct.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  has  been  ingeniously  argued  that  the 
huge  tail  served  to  store  up  fat  when  food  was 
plenty,  which  was  drawn  upon  when  food  be- 
came scarce.  The  fur  seals  do  something  sim- 
ilar to  this,  for  the  males  come  on  shore  in 
May  rolling  in  blubber,  and  depart  in  Septem- 


60  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

ber  lean  and  hungry  after  a  three  months' 
fast. 

Zeuglodons  must  have  been  very  numerous 
in  the  old  Gulf  of  Mexico,  for  bones  are  found 
abundantly  through  portions  of  our  Southern 
States ;  it  was  also  an  inhabitant  of  the  old 
seas  of  southern  Europe,  but,  as  we  shall  see, 
it  gave  place  to  the  great  fossil  shark,  and  this 
in  turn  passed  out  of  existence.  Still,  common 
though  its  bones  may  be,  stories  of  their  use 
for  making  stone  walls  —  and  these  stories  are 
still  in  circulation  —  resolve  themselves  on 
close  scrutiny  into  the  occasional  use  of  a  big 
vertebra  to  support  the  corner  of  a  corn-crib. 

The  scientific  name  of  Zeuglodon  is  Basilo- 
saurus,  cetoides,  the  whale-like  king  lizard — the 
first  of  these  names,  Basilosaurus,  having  been 
given  to  it  by  the  original  describer,  Dr.  Har- 
lan,  who  supposed  the  animal  to  have  been  a 
reptile.  Now  it  is  a  primary  rule  of  nomen- 
clature that  the  first  name  given  to  an  animal 
must  stick  and  may  not  be  changed,  even  by 
the  act  of  a  zoological  congress,  so  Zeuglodon 
must,  so  far  as  its  name  is  concerned,  mas- 
querade as  a  reptile  for  the  rest  of  its  paleon- 


RULERS   OF   THE   ANCIENT  SEAS          61 

tological  life.  This,  however,  really  matters 
very  little,  because  scientific  names  are  simply 
verbal  handles  by  which  we  may  grasp  animals 
to  describe  them,  and  Dr.  Le  Conte,  to  show 
how  little  there  may  be  in  a  name,  called  a 
beetle  Gyascutus.  Owen's  name  of  Zeuglodon, 
although  not  tenable  as  a  scientific  name,  is 
too  good  to  be  wasted,  and  being  readily  re- 
membered and  easily  pronounced  may  be  used 
as  a  popular  name. 

One  might  think  that  a  creature  sixty  or 
seventy  feet  long  was  amply  long  enough,  but 
Dr.  Albert  Koch  thought  otherwise,  and  did 
with  Zeuglodon  as,  later  on,  he  did  with  the 
Mastodon,  combining  the  vertebrae  of  several 
individuals  until  he  had  a  monster  114  feet 
long !  This  he  exhibited  in  Europe  under  the 
name  of  Hydrarchus,  or  water  king,  finally 
disposing  of  the  composite  creature  to  the 
Museum  of  Dresden,  where  it  was  promptly 
reduced  to  its  proper  dimensions.  The  nat- 
ural make-up  of  Zeuglodon  is  sufficiently  com- 
posite without  any  aid  from  man,  for  the  head 
and  paddles  are  not  unlike  those  of  a  seal,  the 
ribs  are  like  those  of  a  manatee,  and  the  shoul- 


RULERS   OF   THE   ANCIENT  SEAS  63 

der  blades  are  precisely  like  those  of  a  whale, 
while  the  vertebrae  are  different  from  those 
of  any  other  animal,  even  its  own  cousin  and 
lesser  contemporary  Dorudon.  There  were 
also  tiny  hind  legs  tucked  away  beneath  skin, 
but  these,  as  well  as  many  other  parts  of  the 
animal's  structure  were  unknown,  until  Mr. 
Charles  Schuchert  collected  a  series  of  speci- 
mens for  the  National  Museum,  from  which  it 
was  possible  to  restore  the  entire  skeleton,, 
Owing  to  a  rather  curious  circumstance  the 
first  attempt  at  a  restoration  was  at  fault; 
among  the  bones  originally  obtained  by  Mr. 
Schuchert  there  were  none  from  the  last  half 
of  the  tail,  an  old  gully  having  cut  off  the 
hinder  portion  of  the  backbone  and  destroyed 
the  vertebrae.  Not  far  away,  however,  was  a 
big  lump  of  stone  containing  several  vertebrae 
of  just  the  right  size,  and  these  were  used  as 
models  to  complete  the  papier-mache"  skeleton 
shown  at  Atlanta,  in  1894.  But  a  year  after 
Mr.  Schuchert  collected  a  series  of  vertebrae, 
beginning  with  the  tip  of  the  tail,  and  these 
showed  conclusively  that  the  first  lot  of  tail 
vertebrae  belonged  to  a  creature  still  unde- 


64  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

scribed  and  one  probably  more  like  a  whale 
than  Zeuglodon  himself,  whose  exact  relation- 
ships are  a  little  uncertain,  as  may  be  imagined 
from  what  was  said  of  its  structure.  Mixed 
with  the  bones  of  Zeuglodon  was  the  shell  of 
a  turtle,  nearly  three  feet  long,  and  part  of  the 
backbone  of  a  great  water-snake  that  must 
have  been  twenty-five  feet  long,  both  previ- 
ously quite  unknown.  One  more  curious 
thing  about  Zeuglodon  bones  remains  to  be 
told,  and  then  we  are  done  with  him  ;  ordina- 
rily a  fossil  bone  will  break  indifferently  in  any 
direction,  but  the  bones  of  Zeuglodon  are  built, 
like  an  onion,  of  concentric  layers,  and  these 
have  a  great  tendency  to  peel  off  during  the 
preparation  of  a  specimen. 

And  now,  as  the  wheels  of  time  and  change 
rolled  slowly  on,  sharks  again  came  uppermost, 
and  the  warmer  Eocene  and  Miocene  oceans 
appear  to  have  fairly  teemed  with  these  sea 
wolves.  There  were  small  sharks  with  slender 
teeth  for  catching  little  fishes,  there  were 
larger  sharks  with  saw-like  teeth  for  cutting 
slices  out  of  larger  fishes,  and  there  were  sharks 


RULERS   OF   THE   ANCIENT  SEAS  65 

that  might  almost  have  swallowed  the  biggest 
fish  of  to-day  whole,  sharks  of  a  size  the  waters 
had  never  before  contained,  and  fortunately  do 
not  contain  now.  We  know  these  monsters 
mostly  by  their  teeth,  for  their  skeletons  were 
cartilaginous,  and  this  absence  of  their  remains 
is  probably  the  reason  why  these  creatures  are 
passed  by  while  the  adjectives  huge,  immense, 
enormous  are  lavished  on  the  Mosasaurs  and 
Plesiosaurs  —  animals  that  the  great -toothed 
shark,  Carcharodon  megalodon,  might  well 
have  eaten  at  a  meal.  For  the  gaping  jaws 
of  one  of  these  sharks,  with  its  hundreds  of 
gleaming  teeth  must,  at  a  moderate  estimate, 
have  measured  not  less  than  six  feet  across. 

The  great  White  Shark,  the  man-eater,  so 
often  found  in  story  books,  so  rarely  met  with 
in  real  life,  attains  a  length  of  thirty  feet,  and 
a  man  just  makes  him  a  good,  satisfactory 
lunch.  Now  a  tooth  of  this  shark  is  an  inch 
and  a  quarter  long,  while  a  tooth  of  the  huge 
Megalodon  is  commonly  three,  often  four,  and 
not  infrequently  five  inches  long.  Applying 
the  rule  of  three  to  such  a  tooth  as  this  would 
give  a  shark  120  feet  long,  bigger  than  most 


66  ANIMALS  OF  THE   PAST 

whales,  to  whom  a  man  would  be  but  a 
mouthful,  just  enough  to  whet  his  sharkship's 
appetite.  Even  granting  that  the  rule  of  three 
unduly  magnifies  the  dimensions  of  the  brute, 
and  making  an  ample  reduction,  there  would 
still  remain  a  fish  between  seventy-five  and 
one  hundred  feet  long,  quite  large  enough  to 
satisfy  the  most  ambitious  of  tuna  fishers,  and 
to  have  made  bathing  in  the  Miocene  ocean 
unpopular.  Contemporary  with  the  great- 
toothed  shark  was  another  and  closely  related 
species  that  originated  with  him  in  Eocene 
times,  and  these  two  may  possibly  have  had 
something  to  do  with  the  extinction  of  Zeug- 
lodon.  This  species  is  distinguished  by  hav- 
ing on  either  side  of  the  base  of  the  great  tri- 
angular cutting  teeth  a  little  projection  or 
cusp,  like  the  "ear"  on  ajar,  so  that  this  spe- 
cies has  been  named  auriculatus,  or  eared. 
The  edges  of  the  teeth  are  also  more  saw-like 
than  in  those  of  its  greater  relative,  and  as  the 
species  must  have  attained  a  length  of  fifty  or 
sixty  feet  it  may,  with  its  better  armature, 
have  been  quite  as  formidable.  And,  as  per- 
haps the  readers  of  these  pages  may  know,  the 


RULERS   OF  THE   ANCIENT  SEAS  67 

supply  of  teeth  never  ran  short.  Back  of  each 
tooth,  one  behind  another  arranged  in  serried 
ranks,  lay  a  reserve  of  six  or  seven  smaller,  but 
growing  teeth,  and  whenever  a  tooth  of  the 
front  row  was  lost,  the  tooth  immediately 
behind  it  took  its  place,  and  like  a  well-trained 
soldier  kept  the  front  line  unbroken.  Thus 
the  teeth  of  sharks  are  continually  developing 
at  the  back,  and  all  the  teeth  are  steadily 
pushing  forward,  a  very  simple  mechanical 
arrangement  causing  the  teeth  to  lie  flat  until 
they  reach  the  front  of  the  jaw  and  come 
into  use. 

Once  fairly  started  in  life,  these  huge  sharks 
spread  themselves  throughout  the  warm  seas 
of  the  world,  for  there  was  none  might  stand 
before  them  and  say  nay.  They  swarmed 
along  our  southern  coast,  from  Maryland  to 
Texas ;  they  swarmed  everywhere  that  the  water 
was  sufficiently  warm,  for  their  teeth  occur  in 
Tertiary  strata  in  many  parts  of  the  world,  and 
the  deep-sea  dredges  of  the  Challenger  and 
Albatross  have  brought  up  their  teeth  by  scores. 
And  then  —  they  perished,  perished  as  utterly 
as  did  the  hosts  of  Sennacherib.  Why?  We  do 


68  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

not  know.  Did  they  devour  everything  large 
enough  to  be  eaten  throughout  their  habitat, 
and  then  fall  to  eating  one  another  ?  Again, 
we  do  not  know.  But  perish  they  did,  while 
the  smaller  white  shark,  which  came  into  being 
at  the  same  time,  still  lives,  as  if  to  emphasize 
the  fact  that  it  is  best  not  to  overdo  things, 
and  that  in  the  long  run  the  victory  is  not 
always  to  the  largest. 

REFERENCES 

The  finest  Mosasaur  skeleton  ever  discovered,  an 
almost  complete  skeleton  of  Tylosaurus  dyspelor,  29  feet 
in  length,  may  be  seen  at  the  head  of  the  staircase  lead- 
ing to  the  Hall  of  Paleontology,  in  the  American  Museum 
of  Natural  History,  New  York.  Another  good  specimen 
may  be  seen  in  the  Yale  University  Museum,  which  prob- 
ably has  the  largest  collection  of  Mosasaurs  in  existence. 
Another  fine  collection  is  in  the  Museum  of  the  State 
University  of  Kansas,  at  Lawrence. 

The  best  Zeuglodon,  the  first  to  show  the  vestigial  hind 
legs  and  to  make  clear  other  portions  of  the  structure,  is 
in  the  United  States  National  Museum. 

The  great  sharks  are  known  in  this  country  by  their 
teeth  only,  and,  as  these  are  common  in  the  phosphate 


RULERS   OF   THE   ANCIENT   SEAS 


69 


beds,  specimens  may  be  seen  in  almost  any  collection.  In 
the  United  States  National  Museum,  the  jaws  of  a  twelve- 
foot  blue  shark  are  shown  for  comparison.  The  largest 
tooth  in  that  collection  is  <5f  inches  high  and  5  inches 
across  the  base.  It  takes  Jive  teeth  of  the  blue  shark  to 
Jill  the  same  number  of  inches. 

The  Mosasaurs  are  described  in  detail  by  Professor  S. 
W.  Williston,  in  Vol.  IV.  of  the  "University  Geological 
Survey  of  Kansas.'1''  There  is  a  technical  —  and,  conse- 
quently, uninteresting  —  account  of  Zeuglodon  in  Vol. 
XXIII.  of  the  "  Proceedings  of  tlie  United  States  Na- 
tional Museum,'1''  page  327. 


Fig.  12.  —  A  Tooth  of  Zeuglodon,  one  of  the  "  Yoke 
Teeth/'  from  which  it  derives  the  name. 


BIRDS    OF    OLD 

"  With  head,  hands,  wings,  or  feet,  pursues  his  way, 
And  swims,  or  sinks,  or  wades,  or  creeps,  or  flies." 

When  we  come  to  discuss  the  topic  of  the  ear- 
liest bird  —  not  the  one  in  the  proverb  —  our 
choice  of  subjects  is  indeed  limited,  being  re- 
stricted to  the  famous  and  oft-described  Archse- 
opteryx  from  the  quarries  of  Solenhofen,  which 
at  present  forms  the  starting-point  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  feathered  race.  Bird-like,  or  at 
least  feathered,  creatures,  must  have  existed 
before  this,  as  it  is  improbable  that  feathers 
and  flight  were  acquired  at  one  bound,  and 
this  lends  probability  to  the  view  that  at  least 
some  of  the  tracks  in  the  Connecticut  Valley 
are  really  the  footprints  of  birds.  Not  birds  as 
we  now  know  them,  but  still  creatures  wearing 
feathers,  these  being  the  distinctive  badge  and 
livery  of  the  order.  For  we  may  well  speak 

70 


Fig.    13.  — Archaeopteryx,  the  Earliest   Known  Bird. 
From  the  specimen  in  the  Berlin  Museum. 


BIRDS   OF   OLD  71 

of  the  feathered  race,  the  exclusive  prerogative 
of  the  bird  being  not  flight  but  feathers ;  no 
bird  is  without  them,  no  other  creature  wears 
them,  so  that  birds  may  be  exactly  defined  in 
two  words,  feathered  animals.  Reptiles,  and 
even  mammals,  may  go  quite  naked  or  cover 
themselves  with  a  defensive  armor  of  bony 
plates  or  horny  scales  ;  but  under  the  blaze  of 
the  tropical  sun  or  in  the  chill  waters  of  arctic 
seas  birds  wear  feathers  only,  although  in  the 
penguins  the  feathers  have  become  so  changed 
that  their  identity  is  almost  lost. 

So  far  as  flight  goes,  there  is  one  entire  order 
of  mammals,  whose  members,  the  bats,  are 
quite  as  much  at  home  in  the  air  as  the  birds 
themselves,  and  in  bygone  days  the  empire  of 
the  air  belonged  to  the  pterodactyls ;  even  frogs 
and  fishes  have  tried  to  fly,  and  some  of  the 
latter  have  nearly  succeeded  in  the  attempt. 
As  for  wings,  it  may  be  said  that  they  are 
made  on  very  different  patterns  in  such  animals 
as  the  pterodactyl,  bat,  and  bird,  and  that 
while  the  end  to  be  achieved  is  the  same,  it  is 
reached  by  very  different  methods.  The  wing 
membrane  of  a  bat  is  spread  between  his  out- 


Fig.    14.  — Nature's   Four   Methods   of  Making  a  Wing. 
Bat,  Pterodactyl,  Archaeopteryx,  and  Modern  Bird. 


BIRDS   OF   OLD  73 

stretched  fingers,  the  thumb  alone  being  left 
free,  while  in  the  pterodactyl  the  thumb  is 
wanting  and  the  membrane  supported  only  by 
what  in  us  is  the  little  finger,  a  term  that  is  a 
decided  misnomer  in  the  case  of  the  pterodac- 
tyl. In  birds  the  fingers  have  lost  their  in- 
dividuality, and  are  modified  for  the  attach- 
ment or  support  of  the  wing  feathers,  but  in 
Archseopteryx  the  hand  had  not  reached  this 
stage,  for  the  fingers  were  partly  free  and 
tipped  with  claws. 

We  get  some  side  lights  on  the  structure  of 
primitive  birds  by  studying  the  young  and  the 
earlier  stages  of  living  species,  for  in  a  very 
general  way  it  may  be  said  that  the  develop- 
ment of  the  individual  is  a  sort  of  rough  sketch 
or  hasty  outline  of  the  development  of  the  class 
of  which  it  is  a  member ;  thus  the  transitory 
stages  through  which  the  chick  passes  before 
hatching  give  us  some  idea  of  the  structure  of 
the  adult  birds  or  bird-like  creatures  of  long 
ago.  Now,  in  embryonic  birds  the  wing  ends 
in  a  sort  of  paw  and  the  fingers  are  separate, 
quite  different  from  what  they  become  a  little 
later  on,  and  not  unlike  their  condition  in 


74  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

Archaeopteryx,  and  even   more   like  what  is 
found  in  the  wing  of  an  ostrich. 

Then,  too,  there  are  a  few  birds  still  left, 
such  as  the  ostrich,  that  have  not  kept  pace 
with  the  others,  and  are  a  trifle  more  like 
reptiles  than  the  vast  majority  of  their  rela- 
tives, and  these  help  a  little  in  explaining  the 
structure  of  early  birds.  Among  these  is  a 
queer  bird  with  a  queer  name,  Hoactzin,  found 
in  South  America,  which  when  young  uses  its 
little  wings  much  like  legs,  just  as  we  may 
suppose  was  done  by  birds  of  old,  to  climb 
about  the  branches.  Mr.  Quelch,  who  has 
studied  these  curious  birds  in  their  native  wilds 
of  British  Guiana,  tells  us  that  soon  after  hatch- 
ing,the  nestlings  begin  to  crawl  about  by  means 
of  their  legs  and  wings,  the  well -developed 
claws  on  the  thumb  and  finger  being  constantly 
in  use  for  hooking  to  surrounding  objects.  If 
they  are  drawn  from  the  nest  by  means  of  their 
legs,  they  hold  on  firmly  to  the  twigs,  both  with 
their  bill  and  wings  ;  and  if  the  nest  be  upset 
they  hold  on  to  all  objects  with  which  they 
come  in  contact  by  bill,  feet,  and  wings,  mak- 
ing considerable  use  of  the  bill,  with  the  help 


BIRDS   OF   OLD 


75 


of  the  clawed  wings,  to  raise  themselves  to  a 
higher  level. 

Thus,  by  putting  these  various  facts  together 


Fig.   15.  —  Young  Hoactzins. 

we  obtain  some  pretty  good  ideas  regarding  the 
appearance  and  habits  of  the  first  birds.  The 
immediate  ancestors  of  birds,  their  exact  point 


76  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

of  departure  from  other  vertebrates,  is  yet  to  be 
discovered  ;  at  one  time  it  was  considered  that 
they  were  the  direct  descendants  of  Dinosaurs, 
or  that  at  least  both  were  derived  from  the 
same  parent  forms,  and  while  that  view  was 
almost  abandoned,  it  is  again  being  brought  for- 
ward with  much  to  support  it.  It  has  also  been 
thought  that  birds  and  those  flying  reptiles,  the 
pterodactyls,  have  had  a  common  ancestry,  and 
the  possibility  of  this  is  still  entertained.  Be 
that  as  it  may,  it  is  safe  to  consider  that  back 
in  the  past,  earlier  than  the  Jurassic,  were  creat- 
ures neither  bird  nor  reptile,  but  possessing 
rudimentary  feathers  and  having  the  promise 
of  a  wing  in  the  structure  of  their  fore  legs, 
and  some  time  one  of  these  animals  may  come 
to  light ;  until  then  Archseopteryx  remains  the 
earliest  known  bird. 

In  the  Jurassic,  then,  when  the  Dinosaurs 
were  the  lords  of  the  earth  and  small  mammals 
just  beginning  to  appear,  we  come  upon  traces 
of  full-fledged  birds.  The  first  intimation  of 
their  presence  was  the  imprint  of  a  single  feather 
found  in  that  ancient  treasure-house,  the  Solen- 
hofen  quarries ;  but  as  Hercules  was  revealed 


BIRDS   OF   OLD  77 

by  his  foot,  so  the  bird  was  made  evident  by 
the  feather  whose  discovery  was  announced 
August  15,  1861.  And  a  little  later,  in  Sep- 
tember of  the  same  year,  the  bird  itself  turned 
up,  and  in  1877  a  second  specimen  was  found, 
the  two  representing  two  species,  if  not  two 
distinct  genera.  These  were  very  different 
from  any  birds  now  living — so  different,  indeed, 
and  bearing  such  evident  traces  of  their  reptil- 
ian ancestry,  that  it  is  necessary  to  place  them 
apart  from  other  animals  in  a  separate  division 
of  the  class  birds. 

Archseopteryx  was  considerably  smaller  than 
a  crow,  with  a  stout  little  head  armed  with 
sharp  teeth  (as  scarce  as  hens'  teeth  was  no 
joke  in  that  distant  period),  while  as  he  flut- 
tered through  the  air  he  trailed  after  him  a  tail 
longer  than  his  body,  beset  with  feathers  on 
either  side.  Everyone  knows  that  nowadays 
the  feathers  of  a  bird's  tail  are  arranged  like 
the  sticks  of  a  fan,  and  that  the  tail  opens  and 
shuts  like  a  fan.  But  in  Archasopteryx  the 
feathers  were  arranged  in  pairs,  a  feather  on 
each  side  of  every  joint  of  the  tail,  so  that  on  a 
small  scale  the  tail  was  something  like  that  of 


78  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

a  kite  ;  and  because  of  this  long,  lizard-like  tail 
this  bird  and  his  immediate  kith  and  kin  are 
placed  in  a  group  dubbed  Saururae,  or  lizard 
tailed. 

Because  impressions  of  feathers  are  not  found 
all  around  these  specimens  some  have  thought 
that  they  were  confined  to  certain  portions  of 
the  body  —  the  wings,  tail,  and  thighs  —  the 
other  parts  being  naked.  There  seems,  how- 
ever, no  good  reason  to  suppose  that  such  was 
the  case,  for  it  is  extremely  improbable  that 
such  perfect  and  important  feathers  as  those  of 
the  wings  and  tail  should  alone  have  been  de- 
veloped, while  there  are  many  reasons  why  the 
feathers  of  the  body  might  have  been  lost  be- 
fore the  bird  was  covered  by  mud,  or  why  their 
impressions  do  not  show. 

It  was  a  considerable  time  after  the  finding 
of  the  first  specimen  that  the  presence  of  teeth 
in  the  jaws  was  discovered,  partly  because  the 
British  Museum  specimen  was  imperfect,*  and 
partly  because  no  one  suspected  that  birds  had 
ever  possessed  teeth,  and  so  no  one  ever  looked 

*  The  skull  was  lacking,  and  a  part  of  the  upper  jaw  lying 
to  one  side  was  thought  to  belong  to  ajish. 


BIRDS   OF  OLD  79 

for  them.  When,  in  1877,  a  more  complete 
example  was  found,  the  existence  of  teeth  was 
unmistakably  shown;  but  in  the  meantime, 
in  February,  1873,  Professor  Marsh  had  an- 
nounced the  presence  of  teeth  in  Hesperornis, 
and  so  to  him  belongs  the  credit  of  being  the 
discoverer  of  birds  with  teeth. 

The  next  birds  that  we  know  are  from  our 
own  country,  and  although  separated  by  an  in- 
terval of  thousands  of  years  from  the  Jurassic 
Archseopteryx,  time  enough  for  the  members 
of  one  group  to  have  quite  lost  their  wings,  they 
still  retain  teeth,  and  in  this  respect  the  most 
bird-like  of  them  is  quite  unlike  any  modern  bird. 
These  come  from  the  chalk  beds  of  western 
Kansas,  and  the  first  specimens  were  obtained 
by  Professor  Marsh  in  his  expeditions  of  1870 
and  1871,  but  not  until  a  few  years  later,  after 
the  material  had  been  cleaned  and  was  being 
studied,  was  it  ascertained  that  these  birds  were 
armed  with  teeth.  The  smaller  of  these  birds, 
which  was  apparently  not  unlike  a  small  gull 
in  general  appearance,  was,  saving  its  teeth,  so 
thoroughly  a  bird  that  it  may  be  passed  by  with- 
out further  notice,  but  the  larger  was  remark- 


80  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

able  in  many  ways.  Hesperornis,  the  western 
bird,  was  a  great  diver,  in  some  ways  the  great- 
est of  the  divers,  for  it  stood  higher  than  the 
king  penguin,  though  more  slender  and-grace- 
ful  in  general  build,  looking  somewhat  like  an 
overgrown,  absolutely  wingless  loon. 

The  penguins,  as  everyone  knows,  swim  with 
their  front  limbs  —  we  can't  call  them  wings  — 
which,  though  containing  all  the  bones  of  a 
wing,  have  become  transformed  into  powerful 
paddles  ;  Hesperornis,  on  the  other  hand,  swam 
altogether  with  its  legs  —  swam  so  well  with 
them,  indeed,  that  through  disuse  the  wings 
dwindled  away  and  vanished,  save  one  bone. 
This,  however,  is  not  stating  the  theory  quite 
correctly ;  of  course  the  matter  cannot  be  actu- 
ally proved.  Hesperornis  was  a  large  bird,  up- 
wards of  five  feet  in  length,  and  if  its  ances- 
tors were  equally  bulky  their  wings  were  quite 
too  large  to  be  used  in  swimming  under  water, 
as  are  those  of  such  short-winged  forms  as  the 
Auks  which  fly  under  the  water  quite  as  much 
as  they  fly  over  it.  Hence  the  wings  were 
closely  folded  upon  the  body  so  as  to  offer  the 
least  possible  resistance,  and  being  disused,  they 


BIRDS   OF  OLD  81 

and  their  muscles  dwindled,  while  the  bones 
and  muscles  of  the  legs  increased  by  constant 
use.  By  the  time  the  wings  were  small  enough 
to  be  used  in  so  dense  a  medium  as  water  the 
muscles  had  become  too  feeble  to  move  them, 
and  so  degeneration  proceeded  until  but  one 
bone  remained,  a  mere  vestige  of  the  wing  that 
had  been.  The  penguins  retain  their  great 
breast  muscles,  and  so  did  the  Great  Auk,  be- 
cause their  wings  are  used  in  swimming,  since 
it  requires  even  more  strength  to  move  a  small 
wing  in  water  than  it  does  to  move  a  large 
wing  in  the  thinner  air.  As  for  our  domesti- 
cated fowls  —  the  turkeys,  chickens,  and  ducks 
—  there  has  not  been  sufficient  lapse  of  time 
for  their  muscles  to  dwindle,  and  besides  arti- 
ficial selection,  the  breeding  of  fowls  for  food 
has  kept  up  the  mere  size  of  the  muscles,  al- 
though these  lack  the  strength  to  be  found  in 
those  of  wild  birds. 

As  a  swimming  bird,  one  that  swims  with  its 
legs  and  not  with  its  wings,  Hesperornis  has 
probably  never  been  equalled,  for  the  size  and 
appearance  of  the  bones  indicate  great  power, 
while  the  bones  of  the  foot  were  so  joined  to 


82  ANIMALS    OF   THE    PAST 

those  of  the  leg  as  to  turn  edgewise  as  the  foot 
was  brought  forward  and  thus  to  offer  the  least 
possible  resistance  to  the  water.  It  is  a  re- 
markable fact  that  the  leg  bones  of  Hesperornis 
are  hollow,  remarkable  because  as  a  rule  the 
bones  of  aquatic  animals  are  more  or  less  solid, 
their  weight  being  supported  by  the  water;  but 
those  of  the  great  diver  were  almost  as  light  as 
if  it  had  dwelt  upon  the  dry  land.  That  it  did 
not  dwell  there  is  conclusively  shown  by  its 
build,  and  above  all  by  its  feet,  for  the  foot  of 
a  running  bird  is  modified  in  quite  another 
way. 

The  bird  was  probably  covered  with  smooth, 
soft  feathers,  something  like  those  of  an  Apte- 
ryx  ;  this  we  know  because  Professor  Williston 
found  a  specimen  showing  the  impression  of 
the  skin  of  the  lower  part  of  the  leg  as  well  as 
of  the  feathers  that  covered  the  "  thigh  "  and 
head.  While  such  a  covering  seems  rather  in- 
adequate for  a  bird  of  such  exclusively  aquatic 
habits  as  Hesperornis  must  have  been,  there 
seems  no  getting  away  from  the  facts  in  the 
case  in  the  shape  of  Professor  Williston's  spec- 
imen, and  we  have  in  the  Snake  Bird,  one  of 


* 


BIRDS   OF   OLD  83 

the  most  aquatic  of  recent  birds,  an  instance  of 
similarly  poor  covering.  As  all  know  who  have 
seen  this  bird  at  home,  its  feathers  shed  the  wa- 
ter very  imperfectly,  and  after  long- continued 
submersion  become  saturated,  a  fact  which  part- 
ly accounts  for  the  habit  the  bird  has  of  hanging 
itself  out  to  dry, 

The  restoration  which  Mr.  Gleeson  has  drawn 
differs  radically  from  any  yet  made,  and  is  the 
result  of  a  careful  study  of  the  specimen  be- 
longing to  the  United  States  National  Museum. 
No  one  can  appreciate  the  peculiarities  of  Hes- 
perornis  and  its  remarkable  departures  from 
other  swimming  birds  who  has  not  seen  the 
skeleton  mounted  in  a  swimming  attitude. 
The  great  length  of  the  legs,  their  position  at 
the  middle  of  the  body,  the  narrowness  of  the 
body  back  of  the  hip  joint,  and  the  dispropor- 
tionate length  of  the  outer  toe  are  all  brought 
out  in  a  manner  which  a  picture  of  the  bird 
squatting  upon  its  haunches  fails  utterly  to 
show.  As  for  the  tail,  it  is  evident  from  the 
size  and  breadth  of  the  bones  that  something 
of  the  kind  was  present ;  it  is  also  evident  that 
it  was  not  like  that  of  an  ordinary  bird,  and  so 


84  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

it  has  been  drawn  with  just  a  suggestion  of 
Archseopteryx  about  it. 

The  most  extraordinary  thing  about  Hespe- 
rornis,  however,  is  the  position  of  the  legs  rela- 
tive to  the  body,  and  this  is  something  that 
was  not  even  suspected  until  the  skeleton  was 
mounted  in  a  swimming  attitude.  As  anyone 
knows  who  has  watched  a  duck  swim,  the  usual 
place  for  the  feet  and  legs  is  beneath  and  in  a 
line  with  the  body.  But  in  our  great  extinct 
diver  the  articulations  of  the  leg  bones  are  such 
that  this  is  impossible,  and  the  feet  and  lower 
joint  of  the  legs  (called  the  tarsus)  must  have 
stood  out  nearly  at  right  angles  to  the  body, 
like  a  pair  of  oars.  This  is  so  peculiar  and 
anomalous  an  attitude  for  a  bird's  legs  that, 
although  apparently  indicated  by  the  shape  of 
the  bones,  it  was  .at  first  thought  to  be  due 
to  the  crushing  and  consequent  distortion  to 
which  the  bones  had  been  subjected,  and  an 
endeavor  was  made  to  place  the  legs  in  the 
ordinary  position,  even  though  this  was  done 
at  the  expense  of  some  little  dislocation  of  the 
joints.  But  when  the  mounting  of  the  skele- 
ton had  advanced  further  it  became  more 


BIRDS   OF   OLD  85 

evident  that  Hesperornis  was  not  an  ordinary 
bird,  and  that  he  could  not  have  swum  in  the 
usual  manner,  since  this  would  have  brought  his 
great  knee-caps  up  into  his  body,  which  would 
have  been  uncomfortable.  And  so,  at  the  cost 
of  some  little  time  and  trouble,*  the  mount- 
ings were  so  changed  that  the  legs  stood  out  at 
the  sides  of  the  body,  as  shown  in  the  picture. 

A  final  word  remains  to  be  said  about 
toothed  birds,  which  is,  that  the  visitor  who 
looks  upon  one  for  the  first  time  will  probably 
be  disappointed.  The  teeth  are  so  loosely  im- 
planted in  the  jaw  that  most  of  them  fall  out 
shortly  after  death,  while  the  few  that  remain 
are  so  small  as  not  to  attract  observation. 

By  the  time  the  Eocene  Period  was  reached, 
even  before  that,  birds  had  become  pretty 
much  what  we  now  see  them,  and  very  little 

*  The  mounting  of  fossil  bones  is  quite  a  different  matter 
from  the  wiring  of  an  ordinary  skeleton,  since  the  bones  are  not 
only  so  hard  that  they  cannot  be  bored  and  wired  like  those  of  a 
recent  animal,  bid  they  are  so  brittle  and  heavy  that  often  they 
will  not  sustain  their  own  weight.  Hence  such  bones  must  be 
supported  from  the  outside,  aud  to  do  this  so  that  the  mountings 
will  be  strong  enough  to  support  their  weight,  allow  the  bones  to 
be  removed  for  study,  and  yet  be  inconspicuous,  is  a  difficult  task. 


86  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

change  has  taken  place  in  them  since  that 
time;  they  seem  to  have  become  so  exactly 
adapted  to  the  conditions  of  existence  that  no 
further  modification  has  taken  place.  This 
may  be  expressed  in  another  way,  by  saying 
that  while  the  Mammals  of  the  Eocene  have 
no  near  relatives  among  those  now  living, 
entire  large  groups  having  passed  completely 
out  of  existence,  the  few  birds  that  we  know 
might,  so  far  as  their  appearance  and  affinities 
go,  have  been  killed  yesterday. 

Were  we  to  judge  of  the  former  abundance 
of  birds  by  the  number  we  find  in  a  fossil 
state,  we  should  conclude  that  in  the  early 
days  of  the  world  they  were  remarkably  scarce, 
for  bird  bones  are  among  the  rarest  of  fossils. 
But  from  the  high  degree  of  development  evi- 
denced by  the  few  examples  that  have  come 
to  light,  and  the  fact  that  these  represent 
various  and  quite  distinct  species,*  we  are  led 

*  But  three  birds,  besides  a  stray  feather  or  two,  are  so  far 
known  from  the  Eocene  of  North  America.  One  of  these  is  a 
fowl  not  very  unlike  some  of  the  small  curassows  of  South 
America  ;  another  is  a  little  bird,  supposed  to  be  related  to  the 
sparrows,  while  the  third  is  a  large  bird  of  uncertain  relation- 
ships. 


BIRDS   OF   OLD  87 

to  conclude  that  birds  were  abundant  enough, 
but  that  we  simply  do  not  find  them. 

Several  eggs,  too  —  or,  rather,  casts  of  eggs 
—  have  lately  been  found  in  the  Cretaceous 
and  Miocene  strata  of  the  West ;  and,  as  eggs 
and  birds  are  usually  associated,  we  are  liable 
at  any  time  to  come  upon  the  bones  of  the 
birds  that  laid  them. 

To  the  writer's  mind  no  thoroughly  satisfac- 
tory explanation  has  been  given  for  the  scarci- 
ty of  bird  remains  ;  but  the  reason  commonly 
advanced  is  that,  owing  to  their  lightness, 
dead  birds  float  for  a  much  longer  time  than 
other  animals,  and  hence  are  more  exposed  to 
the  ravages  of  the  weather  and  the  attacks  of 
carrion-feeding  animals.  It  has  also  been  said 
that  the  power  of  flight  enabled  birds  to 
escape  calamities  that  caused  the  death  of  con- 
temporary animals  ;  but  all  birds  do  not  fly ; 
and  birds  do  fall  victims  to  storms,  cold,  and 
starvation,  and  even  perish  of  pestilence,  like 
the  Cormorants  of  Bering  Island,  whose  ranks 
have  twice  been  decimated  by  disease. 

It  is  true  that  where  carnivorous  animals 
abound,  dead  birds  do  disappear  quickly ;  and 


88  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

my  friend  Dr.  Stejneger  tells  me  that,  while 
hundreds  of  dead  sea-fowl  are  cast  on  the 
shores  of  the  Commander  Islands,  it  is  a  rare 
thing  to  find  one  after  daylight,  as  the  bodies 
are  devoured  by  the  Arctic  foxes  that  prowl 
about  the  shores  at  night.  But,  again,  as  in 
the  Miocene  of  Southern  France  and  in  the 
Pliocene  of  Oregon,  remains  of  birds  are  fairly 
numerous,  showing  that,  under  proper  con- 
ditions, their  bones  are  preserved  for  future 
reference,  so  that  we  may  hope  some  day  to 
come  upon  specimens  that  will  enable  us  to 
round  out  the  history  of  bird  life  in  the  past. 

REFERENCES 

Thejirst  discovered  specimen  of  Archceopteryx,  Archce- 
opteryx macrura,  is  in  the  British  Museum,  the  second 
more  complete  example  is  in  the  Royal  Museum  of  Nat- 
ural History,  Berlin.  The  largest  collection  of  toothed 
birds,  including  the  types  of  Hesperornis,  Ichthyornis 
and  others,  is  in  the  Yale  University  Museum,  at  New 
Haven.  The  United  States  National  Museum  at  Wash- 
ington has  a  fine  mounted  skeleton  of  Hesperornis,  and 
the  State  University  of  Kansas,  at  Lawrence,  has  the  ex- 
ample showing  the  impressions  of  feathers. 


BIRDS    OF   OLD  89 

For  scientific  descriptions  of  these  birds  the  reader  is 
referred  to  Owen's  paper  "  On  the  Archceopteryx  of  von 
Meyer •,  with  a  Description  of  the  Fossil  Remains,  etc."  in 
the  "  Transactions  of  the  Philosophical  Society  of  London 
for  1863"  page  33,  and  "  Odontornithes,  a  Monograph 
of  the  Extinct  Toothed  Birds  of  North  America"  by  O. 
C.  Marsh.  Much  popular  and  scientific  information 
concerning  the  early  birds  is  to  be  found  in  Newtdn's 
«  Dictionary  of  Birds"  and  «  The  Story  of  Bird  Life" 
by  W.  P.  Pycraft ;  the  "  Structure  and  Life  of  Birds" 
by  F.  W.  Headley ;  "  The  Story  of  the  Birds"  by  J. 
Newton  Baskett. 


Fig.    17.  —  Archaeopteryx  as  Restored  by  Mr.  Pycraft. 


VI 

THE   DINOSAURS 

"  Shapes  of  all  sorts  and  sizes,  great  and  small" 

A  few  million  years  ago,  geologists  and  phys- 
icists do  not  agree  upon  the  exact  number, 
although  both  agree  upon  the  millions,  when 
the  Rocky  Mountains  were  not  yet  born  and 
the  now  bare  and  arid  western  plains  a  land 
of  lakes,  rivers,  and  luxuriant  vegetation,  the 
region  was  inhabited  by  a  race  of  strange  and 
mighty  reptiles  upon  whom  science  has  be- 
stowed the  appropriate  name  of  Dinosaurs,  or 
terrible  lizards. 

Our  acquaintance  with  the  Dinosaurs  is 
comparatively  recent,  dating  from  the  early 
part  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  in  Amer- 
ica, at  least,  the  date  may  be  set  at  1818,  when 
the  first  Dinosaur  remains  were  found  in  the 
Valley  of  the  Connecticut,  although  they  nat- 
urally were  not  recognized  as  such,  nor  had  the 

90 


it 

£ 


THE   DINOSAURS  91 

term  been  devised.  The  first  Dinosaur  to  be 
formally  recognized  as-  representing  quite  a 
new  order  of  reptiles  was  the  carnivorous 
Megalosaur,  found  near  Oxford,  England,  in 
1824. 

For  a  long  time  our  knowledge  of  Dino- 
saurs was  very  imperfect  and  literally  frag- 
mentary, depending  mostly  upon  scattered 
teeth,  isolated  vertebrae,  or  fragments  of  bone 
picked  up  on  the  surface  or  casually  encoun- 
tered in  some  mine  or  quarry.  Now,  however, 
thanks  mainly  to  the  labors  of  American  pa- 
laeontologists, thanks  also  to  the  rich  deposits 
of  fossils  in  our  Western  States,  we  have  an 
extensive  knowledge  of  the  Dinosaurs,  of  their 
size,  structure,  habits,  and  general  appearance. 

There  are  to-day  no  animals  living  that  are 
closely  related  to  them  ;  none  have  lived  for  a 
long  period  of  time,  for  the  Dinosaurs  came  to 
an  end  in  the  Cretaceous,  and  it  can  only  be 
said  that  the  crocodiles,  on  the  one  hand,  and 
the  ostriches,  on  the  other,  are  the  nearest  ex- 
isting relatives  of  these  great  reptiles. 

For,  though  so  different  in  outward  appear, 
ance,  birds  and  reptiles  are  structurally  quite 


92  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

closely  allied,  and  the  creeping  snake  and  the 
bird  on  which  it  preys  are  relatives,  although 
any  intimate  relationship  between  them  is  of 
the  serpent's  making,  and  is  strongly  objected 
to  by  the  bird. 

But  if  we  compare  the  skeleton  of  a  Dino- 
saur with  that  of  an  ostrich  —  a  young  one  is 
preferable  —  and  with  those  of  the  earlier  birds, 
we  shall  find  that  many  of  the  barriers  now  ex- 
isting between  reptiles  and  birds  are  broken 
down,  and  that  they  have  many  points  hi  com- 
mon. In  fact,  save  in  the  matter  of  clothes, 
wherein  birds  differ  from  all  other  animals,  the 
two  great  groups  are  not  so  very  far  apart. 

The  Dinosaurs  were  by  no  means  confined 
to  North  America,  although  the  western  United 
States  seem  to  have  been  their  headquarters, 
but  ranged  pretty  much  over  the  world,  for 
their  remains  have  been  found  in  every  conti- 
nent, even  in  far-off  New  Zealand. 

In  point  of  time  they  ranged  from  the  Trias 
to  the  Upper  Cretaceous,  their  golden  age, 
marking  the  culminating  point  of  reptilian  life, 
being  in  the  Jurassic,  when  huge  forms  stalked 
by  the  sea-shore,  browsed  amid  the  swamps,  or 


THE    DINOSAURS  93 

disported  themselves  along  the  reedy  margins 
of  lakes  and  rivers. 

They  had  their  day,  a  day  of  many  thou- 
sand years,  and  then  passed  away,  giving 
place  to  the  superior  race  of  mammals  which 
was  just  springing  into  being  when  the  huge 
Dinosaurs  were  in  the  heyday  of  their  exist- 
ence. 

And  it  does  seem  as  if  in  the  dim  and  distant 
past,  as  in  the  present,  brains  were  a  potent 
factor  in  the  struggle  for  supremacy;  for, 
though  these  reptiles  were  giants  in  size,  domi- 
nating the  earth  through  mere  brute  force, 
they  were  dwarfs  in  intellect. 

The  smallest  human  brain  that  is  thought  to 
be  compatible  with  life  itself  weighs  a  little 
over  ten  ounces,  the  smallest  that  can  exist 
with  reasoning  powers  is  two  pounds ;  this  in  a 
creature  weighing  from  120  to  150  pounds. 

What  do  we  find  among  Dinosaurs  ?  Thes- 
pesius,  or  Claosaurus,  which  may  have  walked 
where  Baltimore  now  stands,  was  twenty-five 
feet  in  length  and  stood  a  dozen  feet  high  in 
his  bare  feet,  had  a  brain  smaller  than  a  man's 
clenched  fist,  weighing  less  than  one  pound. 


94  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

Brontosaurus,  in  some  respects  the  biggest 
brute  that  ever  walked,  was  but  little  better  off, 
and  Triceratops,  and  his  relatives,  creatures 
having  twice  the  bulk  of  an  elephant,  weighing 
probably  over  ten  tons,  possessed  a  brain  weigh- 
ing not  over  two  pounds  ! 

How  much  of  what  we  term  intelligence 
could  such  a  creature  possess  —  what  was  the 
extent  of  its  reasoning  powers  ?  Judging  from 
our  own  standpoint  and  the  small  amount  of 
intellect  apparent  in  some  humans  with  much 
larger  brains,  these  big  reptiles  must  have 
known  just  about  enough  to  have  eaten  when 
they  were  hungry,  anything  more  was  super- 
fluous. 

However,  intelligence  is  one  thing,  life  an- 
other, and  the  spinal  cord,  with  its  supply  of 
nerve-substance,  doubtless  looked  after  the 
mere  mechanical  functions  of  life ;  and  while 
even  the  spinal  cord  is  in  many  cases  quite 
small,  in  some  places,  particularly  in  the  sacral 
region,  it  is  subject  to  considerable  enlarge- 
ment. This  is  notably  true  of  Stegosaurus, 
where  the  sacral  enlargement  is  twenty  times 
the  bulk  of  the  puny  brain  —  a  fact  noted  by 


THE   DINOSAURS  95 

Professor  Marsh,  and  seized  upon  by  the  news- 
papers, which  announced  that  he  had  discov- 
ered a  Dinosaur  with  a  brain  in  its  pelvis. 
/In  their  great  variety  of  size  and  shape  the 
/Dinosaurs  form  an  interesting  parallel  with 
I  the  Marsupials  of  Australia.  For  just  as 
these  are,  as  it  were,  an  epitome  of  the  class 
of  mammals,  mimicking  the  herbivores,  car- 
nivores, rodents  and  even  monkeys,  so  there 
are  carnivorous  and  herbivorous  Dinosaurs  — 
Dinosaurs  that  dwelt  on  land  and  others  that 
habitually  resided  in  the  water,  those  that 
walked  upright  and  those  that  crawled  about 
on  all  fours  ;  and,  while  there  are  no  hints  that 
any  possessed  the  power  of  flight,  some  mem- 
bers of  the  group  are  very  bird-like  in  form 
and  structure,  so  much  so  that  it  has  been 
thought  that  the  two  may  have  had  a  common 
ancestry. 

The  smallest  of  the  Dinosaurs  whose  ac- 
quaintance we  have  made  were  little  larger 
than  chickens ;  the  largest  claim  the  distinc- 
tion of  being  the  largest  known  quadrupeds 
that  have  walked  the  face  of  the  earth,  the 
giants  not  only  of  their  day,  but  of  all  time, 


96 


ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

before  whose  huge  frames 
the  bones  of  the  Mam- 
moth, that  familiar  by- 
word for  all  things  great, 
seem  slight. 

For    Brontosaurus,    the 
Thunder   Lizard,   beneath 
whose    mighty  tread    the 
earth  shook,  and  his  kin- 
dred were  from  40  to  60 
feet  long  and  10  to  14  feet 
high,    their    thigh    bones 
measuring  5  to  6  feet  in 
length,   being   the  largest 
single     bones     known    to 
us,    while    some    of    the 
vertebra?     were     4j     feet 
high,  exceeding  in  dimen- 
sions   those    of   a    whale. 
The    group    to 
which  Brontosaurus 
belongs,  including 
33  |p|   Diplodocus    and 
I  Fig.  19.  —  A  Hind  Leg    Morosaurus,  is  dis- 

of  the    Great    Brontosaurus,     tinguished     by     a 
the  Largest  of  the  Dinosaurs. 


THE   DINOSAURS 


97 


large,  though  rather  short,  body,  very  long 
neck  and  tail,  and,  for  the  size  of  the  animal, 
a  very  small  head.  In  fact,  the  head  was  so 
small  and,  in  the  case  of  Diplodocus,  so  poorly 
provided  with  teeth  that  it  must 
have  been  quite  a  task,  or  a  long- 
continued  pleasure,  according  to 
the  state  of  its  di- 
gestive apparatus, 
for  the  animal  to 
have  eaten  its  daily 
meal. 

An  elephant 
weighing  5  tons 
eats  100  pounds  of 
hay  and  25  pounds 
of  grain  for  his 
day's  ration  ;  but, 
as  this  food  is  in  a 
comparatively  con- 
centrated form,  it 
would  require  at  least  twice  this  weight  of 
green  fodder. 

It  is  a  difficult  matter  to  estimate  the  weight 
of  a  live  Diplodocus  or  a  Brontosaurus,  but  it 


Fig.  20.  —  A  Single  Vertebra  of 
Brontosaurus. 


98  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

is  pretty  safe  to  say  that  it  would  not  be  far 
from  20  tons,  and  that  one  would  devour  at 
the  very  least  something  over  700  pounds  of 
leaves  or  twigs  or  plants  each  day  —  more,  if 
the  animal  felt  really  hungry. 

But  here  we  must,  even  if  reluctantly,  curb 
our  imagination  a  little  and  consider  another 
point :  the  cold-blooded,  sluggish  reptiles,  as 
we  know  them  to-day,  do  not  waste  their  en- 
ergies in  rapid  movements,  or  in  keeping  the 
temperature  of  their  bodies  above  that  of  the 
air,  and  so  by  no  means  require  the  amount 
of  food  needed  by  more  active,  warm-blooded 
animals.  Alligators,  turtles,  and  snakes  will 
go  for  weeks,  even  months,  without  food,  and 
while  this  applies  more  particularly  to  those 
that  dwell  in  temperate  climes  and  during 
their  winter  hibernation  practically  suspend 
the  functions  of  digestion  and  respiration,  it  is 
more  or  less  true  of  all  reptiles.  And  as  there 
is  little  reason  for  supposing  that  reptiles  be- 
haved in  the  past  any  differently  from  what 
they  do  in  the  present,  these  great  Dinosaurs 
may,  after  all,  not  have  been  gifted  with  such 
ravenous  appetites  as  one  might  fancy.  Still, 


THE   DINOSAURS  99 

it  is  dangerous  to  lay  down  any  hard  and  fast 
laws  concerning  animals,  and  he  who  writes 
about  them  is  continually  obliged  to  qualify 
his  remarks  —  in  sporting  parlance,  to  hedge 
a  little,  and  in  the  present  instance  there  is 
some  reason,  based  on  the  arrangement  of 
vertebras  and  ribs,  to  suppose  that  the  lungs 
of  Dinosaurs  were  somewhat  like  those  of 
birds,  and  that,  as  a  corollary,  their  blood  may 
have  been  better  aerated  and  warmer  than 
that  of  living  reptiles.  But,  to  return  to  the 
question  of  food. 

From  the  peculiar  character  of  the  articula- 
tions of  the  limb-bones,  it  is  inferred  that  these 
animals  were  largely  aquatic  in  their  habits, 
and  fed  on  some  abundant  species  of  water 
plants.  One  can  readily  see  the  advantage  of 
the  long  neck  in  browsing  off  the  vegetation 
on  the  bottom  of  shallow  lakes,  while  the  ani- 
mal was  submerged,  or  in  rearing  the  head 
aloft  to  scan  the  surrounding  shores  for  the 
approach  of  an  enemy.  Or,  with  the  tail  as  a 
counterpoise,  the  entire  body  could  be  reared 
out  of  water  and  the  head  be  raised  some  thirty 
feet  in  the  air. 


100  ANLMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

Triceratops,  he  of  the  three-horned  face,  had 
a  remarkable  skull  which  projected  backward 
over  the  neck,  like  a  fireman's  helmet,  or  a 
sunbonnet  worn  hind  side  before,  while  over 
each  eye  was  a  massive  horn  directed  forward, 
a  third,  but  much  smaller  horn  being  some- 
times present  on  the  nose. 

The  little  "Horned  Toad,"  which  isn't  a 
toad  at  all,  is  the  nearest  suggestion  we  have 
to-day  of  Triceratops ;  but,  could  he  realize 
the  ambition  of  the  frog  in  the  fable  and 
swell  himself  to  the  dimensions  of  an  ox,  he 
would  even  then  be  but  a  pigmy  compared 
with  his  ancient  and  distant  relative. 

So  far  as  mere  appearance  goes  he  would 
compare  very  well,  for  while  so  much  is  said 
about  the  strange  appearance  of  the  Dinosaurs, 
it  is  to  be  borne  in  mind  that  their  peculiari- 
ties are  enhanced  by  their  size,  and  that  there 
are  many  lizards  of  to-day  that  lack  only 
stature  to  be  even  more  bizarre  ;  and,  for  ex- 
ample, were  the  Australian  Moloch  but  big 
enough,  he  could  give  even  Stegosaurus 
"points"  in  more  ways  than  one. 

Standing  before  the  skull   of  Triceratops, 


THE   DINOSAURS  101 

looking  him  squarely  in  the  face,  one  notices 
in  front  of  each  eye  a  thick  guard  of  projecting 
bone,  and  while  this  must  have  interfered  with 
vision  directly  ahead  it  must  have  also  fur- 
nished protection  for  the  eye.  So  long  as  Tri- 
ceratops  faced  an  adversary  he  must  have 
been  practically  invulnerable,  but  as  he  was 
the  largest  animal  of  his  time,  upward  of 
twenty-five  feet  in  length,  it  is  probable  that 
his  combats  were  mainly  with  those  of  his  own 
kind  and  the  subject  of  dispute  some  fair  fe- 
male upon  whom  two  rival  suitors  had  cast 
covetous  eyes.  What  a  sight  it  would  have 
been  to  have  seen  two  of  these  big  brutes  in 
mortal  combat  as  they  charged  upon  each 
other  with  all  the  impetus  to  be  derived  from 
ten  tons  of  infuriate  flesh !  We  may  picture  to 
ourselves  horn  clashing  upon  horn,  or  glancing 
from  each  bony  shield  until  some  skilful  stroke 
or  unlucky  slip  placed  one  combatant  at  the 
mercy  of  the  other,  and  he  went  down  before 
the  blows  of  his  adversary  "  as  falls  on  Mount 
Alvernus  a  thunder- smitten  oak." 

A  pair  of  Triceratops  horns  in  the  National 
Museum  bears  witness  to  such  encounters,'  for 


102  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

one  is  broken  midway  between  tip  and  base; 
and  that  it  was  broken  during  life  is  evident 
from  the  fact  that  the  stump  is  healed  and 
rounded  over,  while  the  size  of  the  horns  shows 
that  their  owner  reached  a  ripe  old  age. 

For,  unlike  man  and  the  higher  vertebrates, 
reptiles  and  fishes  do  not  have  a  maximum 
standard  of  size  which  is  soon  reached  and 
rarely  exceeded,  but  continue  to  grow 
throughout  life,  so  that  the  size  of  a  turtle,  a 
crocodile,  or  a  Dinosaur  tells  something  of  the 
duration  of  its  life. 

Before  quitting  Triceratops  let  us  glance  for 
a  moment  at  its  skeleton.  Now  among  other 
things  a  skeleton  is  the  solution  of  a  problem 
in  mechanics,  and  in  Triceratops  the  head  so 
dominates  the  rest  of  the  structure  that  one 
might  almost  imagine  the  skull  was  made  first 
and  the  body  adjusted  to  it.  The  great  head 
seems  made  not  only  for  offence  and  defence ; 
the  spreading  frill  serves  for  the  attachment 
of  muscles  to  sustain  the  weight  of  the  skull, 
while  the  work  of  the  muscles  is  made  easier 
by  the  fact  that  the  frill  reaches  so  far  back 
of  the  junction  of  head  with  neck  as  to  largely 


THE   DINOSAURS 


103 


counterbalance  the 
weight  of  the  face 
and  jaws.  When 
we  restored  the 
skull  of  this  ani- 
mal it  was  found 
that  the  centre  of 
gravity  lay  back  of 
the  eye.  Several 
of  the  bones  of  the 
neck  are  united  in 
one  mass  to  fur- 
nish a  firm  attach- 
ment for  the  mus- 
cles that  support 
and  move  the 
skull,  but  as  the 
movements  of  the 
neck  are  already 
restricted  by  the 
overhanging  frill, 
this  loss  of  motion 
is  no  additional  dis- 
advantage. 

To    support   all 


104  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

this  weight  of  skull  and  body  requires  very 
massive  legs,  and  as  the  fore  legs  are  very 
short,  this  enables  Triceratops  to  browse  com- 
fortably from  the  ground  by  merely  lowering 
the  front  of  the  head. 

These  forms  we  have  been  considering  were 
the  giants  of  the  group,  but  a  commoner  spe- 
cies, Thespesius,  though  less  in  bulk  than  those 
just  mentioned,  was  still  of  goodly  proportions, 
for,  as  he  stalked  about,  the  top  of  his  head 
was  twelve  feet  from  the  ground. 

Thespesius  and  his  kin  seem  to  have  been 
comparatively  abundant,  for  they  have  a  wide 
distribution,  and  many  specimens,  some  almost 
perfect,  have  been  discovered  in  this  country 
and  abroad.  No  less  than  twenty-nine  Igu- 
anodons,  a  European  relative  of  Thespesius, 
were  found  in  one  spot  in  mining  for  coal  at 
Bernissart,  Belgium.  Here,  during  long  years 
of  Cretaceous  time,  a  river  slowly  cut  its  way 
through  the  coal-bearing  strata  to  a  depth  of 
750  feet,  a  depth  almost  twice  as  great  as 
the  deepest  part  of  the  gorge  of  Niagara, 
and  then,  this  being  accomplished,  began  the 
work  of  filling  up  the  valley  it  had  excavated. 


THE    DINOSAURS  105 

It  was  then  a  sluggish  stream  with  marshy 
borders,  a  stream  subject  to  frequent  floods, 
when  the  water,  turbid  with  mud  and  laden 
with  sand,  overflowed  its  banks,  leaving  them, 
as  the  waters  subsided,  covered  thickly  with 
mud.  Here,  amidst  the  luxuriant  vegetation 
of  a  semi-tropical  climate,  lived  and  died  the 
Iguanodons,  and  here  the  pick  of  the  miner 
rescued  them  from  their  long  entombment  to 
form  part  of  the  treasures  of  the  museum  at 
Brussels. 

Like  other  reptiles,  living  and  extinct,  Thes- 
pesius  was  continually  renewing  his  teeth,  so 
that  as  fast  as  one  tooth  was  worn  out  it  was 
replaced  by  another,  a  point  wherein  Thespe- 
sius  had  a  decided  advantage  over  ourselves. 
On  the  other  hand,  as  there  was  a  reserve  sup- 
ply of  something  like  400  teeth  in  the  lower 
jaw  alone,  what  an  opportunity  for  the  tooth- 
ache ! 

And  then  we  have  a  multitude  of  lesser  Di- 
nosaurs, including  the  active,  predatory  spe- 
cies with  sharp  claws  and  double-edged  teeth. 
Megalosaurus,  the  first  of  the  Dinosaurs  to  be 
really  known,  was  one  of  these  carnivorous 


106  ANIMALS    OF   THE    PAST 

species,  and  from  our  West  comes  a  near  rela- 
tive, Ceratosaurus,  the  nose-horned  lizard,  a 
queer  beast  with  tiny  fore  legs,  powerful,  sharp- 
clawed  hind  feet,  and  well-armed  jaws.  A 
most  formidable  foe  he  seems,  the  more  that 
the  hollow  bones  speak  of  active  movements, 
and  Professor  Cope  pictured  him,  or  a  near 
relative,  vigorously  engaged  in  combat  with 
his  fellows,  or  preying  upon  the  huge  but  help- 
less herbivores  of  the  marshes,  leaping,  biting, 
and  tearing  his  enemy  to  pieces  with  tooth  and 
claw. 

Professor  Osborn,  on  the  other  hand,  is  in- 
clined to  consider  him  as  a  reptilian  hyena, 
feeding  upon  carrion,  although  one  can  but 
feel  that  such  an  armament  is  not  entirely  in 
the  interests  of  peace. 

Last,  but  by  no  means  least,  are  the  Stego- 
saurs,  or  plated  lizards,  for  not  only  were  they 
beasts  of  goodly  size,  but  they  were  among  the 
most  singular  of  all  known  animals,  singular 
even  for  Dinosaurs.  They  had  diminutive 
heads,  small  fore  legs,  long  tails  armed  on 
either  side  near  the  tip,  with  two  pairs  of  large 
spines,  while  from  these  spines  to  the  neck 


.  . 


THE   DINOSAURS  107 

ran  series  of  large,  but  thin,  and  sharp-edged 
plates  standing  on  edge,  so  that  their  backs 
looked  like  the  bottom  of  a  boat  provided  with 
a  number  of  little  centreboards.  Just  how 
these  plates  were  arranged  is  not  decided  be- 
yond a  peradventure,  but  while  originally  fig- 
ured as  having  them  in  a  single  series  down 
the  back  it  seems  much  more  probable  that 
they  formed  parallel  rows. 

The  largest  of  these  plates  were  two  feet  in 
height  and  length,  and  not  more  than  an  inch 
thick,  except  at  the  base,  where  they  were  en- 
larged and  roughened  to  give  a  firm  hold  to 
the  thick  skin  in  which  they  were  imbedded. 
Be  it  remembered,  too,  that  these  plates  and 
spines  were  doubtless  covered  with  horn,  so 
that  they  were  even  longer  in  life  than  as  we 
now  see  them.  The  tail  spines  varied  in  length, 
according  to  the  species,  from  eight  or  nine 
inches  to  nearly  three  feet,  and  some  of  them 
have  a  diameter  of  six  inches  at  the  base. 
They  were  swung  by  a  tail  eight  to  ten  feet 
long,  and  as  a  visitor  was  heard  to  remark,  one 
wouldn't  like  to  be  about  such  an  animal  in 
fly  time. 


108  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

Such  were  some  of  the  strange  and  mighty 
animals  that  once  roamed  this  continent  from 
the  valley  of  the  Connecticut,  where  they  liter- 
ally left  their  footprints  on  the  sands  of  time, 
to  the  Rocky  Mountains,  where  the  ancient 
lakes  and  rivers  became  cemeteries  for  the  en- 
tombment of  their  bones. 

The  labor  of  the  collector  has  gathered  their 
fossil  remains  from  many  a  Western  canyon, 
the  skill  of  the  preparator  has  removed  them 
from  their  stony  sepulchres  and  the  study  of 
the  anatomist  has  restored  them  as  they  were 
in  life. 

REFERENCES. 

Most  of  our  large  museums  have  on  exhibition  fine 
specimens  of  many  Dinosaurs,  comprising  skulls,  limbs, 
and  large  portions  of  their  skeletons.  The  American 
Museum  of  Natural  History,  New  York,  has  the  largest 
and  finest  display.  The  first  actual  skeleton  of  a  Dino- 
saur to  be  mounted  in  this  country  was  the  splendid  Clao- 
saurus  at  the  Yale  University  Museum,  where  other  strik- 
ing pieces  are  also  to  be  seen.  The  mounting  of  this 
Claosaurus,  which  is  29  feet  long  and  13  feet  high,  took 
an  entire  year.  The  United  States  National  Museum  is 


THE   DINOSAURS  109 

particularly  rich  in  examples  of  the  great,  horned  Tri- 
ceratops,  while  the  Carnegie  Museum,  Pittsburgh,  has 
the  best  Diplodocus.  The  Field  Columbian  Museum  and 
the  Universities  of  Wyoming  and  Colorado  all  have  good 
collections. 

The  largest  single  bone  of  a  Dinosaur  is  the  thigh 
bone  of  a  Brontosaurus  in  the  Field  Columbian  Museum, 
this  measuring  6  feet  8  inches  in  length.  The  height  of 
a  complete  hind  leg  in  the  American  Museum  of  Natural 
History  is  10  feet,  while  a  single  claw  measures  6  by  9 
inches.  The  skeleton  of  Trkeratops  restored  in  papier- 
rnache  for  the  Pan-American  Exposition  measured  25 
feet  from  tip  of  nose  to  end  of  tail  and  was  10  feet  6 
indies  to  the  top  of  the  back-bone  over  the  hips,  this  being 
the  highest  point.  The  head  in  the  United  States  Na- 
tional Museum  used  as  a  model  is  5  feet  6  inches  long 
in  a  straight  line  and  4  fee^  3  inches  across  the  frill. 
There  is  a  skull  in  the  Yale  University  Museum  even 
larger  than  this. 

Articles  relating  to  Dinosaurs  are  mostly  technical  in 
their  nature  and  scattered  through  various  scientific  jour- 
nals. The  most  accessible  probably  is  "  The  Dinosaurs  of 
North  America"  by  Professor  O.  C.  Marsh,  published  as 
part  of  the  sixteenth  annual  report  of  the  United  States 
Geological  Survey.  This  contains  many  figures  of  the 
skulls,  bones,  and  entire  skeletons  of  many  Dinosaurs. 


ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 


Fig.  25.  —  Skull  of  Ceratosaurus. 
From  a  specimen  in  the  United  States  National  Museum. 


110 


VII 

READING   THE   RIDDLES   OF  THE   ROCKS 

"  And  the  Jirst  Morning  of  Creation  wrote 

What  the  Last  Danm  of  Reckoning  shall  read." 

It  is  quite  possible  that  the  reader  may  wish 
to  know  something  of  the  manner  in  which 
the  specimens  described  in  these  pages  have 
been  gathered,  how  we  acquire  our  knowledge 
of  Brontosaurus,  Claosaurus,  or  any  of  the 
many  other  "  sauruses,"  and  how  their  resto- 
rations have  been  made. 

There  was  a  time,  not  so  very  long  ago, 
when  fossils  were  looked  upon  as  mere  sports 
of  Nature,  and  little  attention  paid  to  them ; 
later  their  true  nature  was  recognized,  though 
they  were  merely  gathered  haphazard  as  occa- 
sion might  offer.  But  now,  and  for  many 
years  past,  the  fossil-bearing  rocks  of  many 
parts  of  the  world  have  been  systematically 

worked,  and  from  the  material  thus  obtained 
in 


112  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

we  have  acquired  a  great  deal  of  information 
regarding  the  inhabitants  of  the  ancient  world. 
This  is  particularly  true  of  our  own  western 
country,  where  a  vast  amount  of  collecting  has 
been  done,  although  very  much  remains  to  be 
done  hi  the  matter  of  perfecting  this  knowl- 
edge, and  hosts  of  new  animals  remain  to  be 
discovered.  For  this  information  we  are  almost 
as  much  indebted  to  the  collector  who  has 
gathered  the  needed  material,  and  the  prepar- 
ator  whose  patience  and  skill  have  made  it 
available  for  study,  as  to  the  palaeontologist 
who  has  interpreted  the  meaning  of  the 
bones. 

To  collect  successfully  demands  not  only 
a  knowledge  of  the  rocks  in  which  fossils 
occur  and  of  the  localities  where  they  are  best 
exposed  to  view,  but  an  eye  quick  to  detect  a 
piece  of  bone  protruding  from  a  rock  or  lying 
amongst  the  shale,  and,  above  all,  the  ability 
to  work  a  deposit  to  advantage  after  it  has 
been  found.  The  collector  of  living  animals 
hies  to  regions  where  there  is  plenty  for  bird 
and  beast  to  eat  and  drink,  but  the  collector  of 
extinct  animals  cares  little  for  what  is  on  the 


READING    RIDDLES   OF  THE   ROCKS      113 

surface  of  the  earth  ;  his  great  desire  is  to  see 
as  much  as  possible  of  what  may  lie  beneath. 
So  the  prospector  in  search  of  fossils  betakes 
himself  to  some  region  where  the  ceaseless 
warfare  waged  by  water  against  the  dry  land 
has  seamed  the  face  of  the  earth  with  count- 
less gullies  and  canyons,  or  carved  it  into  slopes 
and  bluffs  in  which  the  edges  of  the  bone- 
bearing  strata  are  exposed  to  view,  and  along 
these  he  skirts,  ever  on  the  look-out  for  some 
projecting  bit  of  bone.  The  country  is  an 
almost  shadeless  desert,  burning  hot  by  day, 
uncomfortably  cool  at  night.  Water  is  scarce, 
and  when  it  can  be  found,  often  has  little  to 
commend  it  save  wetness  ;  but  the  collector  is 
buoyed  up  through  all  this  with  the  hope  that 
he  may  discover  some  creature  new  to  science 
that  shall  not  only  be  bigger  and  uglier  and 
stranger  than  any  heretofore  found,  but  shall 
be  the  long-sought  form  needed  for  the  solu- 
tion of  some  difficult  problem  in  the  history 
of  the  past. 

Now  collecting  is  a  lottery,  differing  from 
most  lotteries,  however,  in  that  while  some  of 
the  returns  may  be  pretty  small,  there  are  few 


114  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

absolute  blanks  and  some  remarkably  large 
prizes,  and  every  collector  hopes  that  it  may 
fall  to  his  lot  to  win  one  of  these,  and  is  willing 
to  work  long  and  arduously  for  the  chance  of 
obtaining  it. 

It  may  give  some  idea  of  the  chances  to  say 
that  some  years  ago  Dr.  Wortman  spent  al- 
most an  entire  season  in  the  field  without  suc- 
cess, and  then,  at  the  eleventh  hour,  found  the 
now  famous  skeleton  of  Phenacodus,  or  that  a 
party  from  Princeton  actually  camped  within 
100  yards  of  a  rich  deposit  of  rare  fossils  and 
yet  failed  to  discover  it. 

Let  us,  however,  suppose  that  the  reconnois- 
sance  has  been  successful,  and  that  an  outcrop 
of  bone  has  been  found,  serving  like  a  tomb- 
stone carven  with  strange  characters  to  indicate 
the  burial-place  of  some  primeval  monster. 
Possibly  Nature  long  ago  rifled  the  grave,  wash- 
ing away  much  of  the  skeleton,  and  leaving 
little  save  the  fragments  visible  on  the  surface  ; 
on  the  other  hand,  these  pieces  may  form  part 
of  a  complete  skeleton,  and  there  is  no  way  to 
decide  this  important  question  save  by  actual 
excavation.  The  manner  of  disinterment  va- 


READING    RIDDLES  OF -THE   ROCKS      115 

ries,  but  much  depends  on  whether  the  fossil 
lies  in  comparatively  loose  shale  or  is  imbedded 
in  the  solid  rock,  whether  the  strata  are  level 
or  dip  downward  into  the  hillside.  If,  unfort- 
unately, this  last  is  the  case,  it  necessitates  a 
careful  shoring  up  of  the  excavation  with  props 
of  cotton-wood  or  such  boards  as  may  have 
been  brought  along  to  box  specimens,  or  it  may 
even  be  necessary  to  run  a  short  tunnel  in  or- 
der to  get  at  some  coveted  bone.  Should  the 
specimen  lie  in  shale,  as  is  the  cas'e  with  most 
of  the  large  reptiles  that  have  been  collected, 
much  of  that  work  may  be  done  with  pick  and 
shovel ;  but  if  it  is  desirable  or  necessary  to 
work  in  firm  rock,  drills  and  hammers,  wedges, 
even  powder,  may  be  needed  to  rend  from  Nat- 
ure her  long-kept  secrets.  In  any  event,  a 
detailed  plan  is  made  of  the  excavation,  and 
each  piece  of  bone  or  section  of  rock  duly  re- 
corded therein  by  letter  and  number,  so  that 
later  on  the  relation  of  the  parts  to  one  an- 
other may  be  known,  or  the  various  sections  as- 
sembled in  the  work-room  exactly  as  they  lay 
in  the  quarry.  Bones  which  lie  in  loose  rock 
are  often,  one  might  say  usually,  more  or  less 


116  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

broken,  and  when  a  bone  three,  four,  or  even 
six  feet  long,  weighing  anywhere  from  100  to 
1,000  pounds,  has  been  shattered  to  fragments 
the  problem  of  removing  it  is  no  easy  one. 
But  here  the  skill  of  the  collector  comes  into 
play  to  treat  the  fossil  as  a  surgeon  treats  a 
fractured  limb,  to  cover  it  with  plaster  band- 
ages, and  brace  it  with  splints  of  wood  or  iron 
so  that  the  specimen  may  not  only  be  taken 
from  the  ground  but  endure  in  safety  the  com- 
ing journey  of  a  thousand  or  more  miles.  For 
simpler  cases  or  lighter  objects  strips  of  sacking, 
or  even  paper,  applied  with  flour  and  water, 
suffice,  or  pieces  of  sacking  soaked  in  thin  plas- 
ter may  be  laid  over  the  bone,  first  covering  it 
with  thin  paper  in  order  that  the  plaster  jacket 
may  simply  stiffen  and  not  adhere  to  it.  Col- 
lecting has  not  always  been  carried  on  in  this 
systematic  manner,  for  the  development  of  the 
present  methods  has  been  the  result  of  years  of 
experience ;  formerly  there  was  a  mere  skim- 
ming-over of  the  surface  in  what  Professor 
Marsh  used  to  term  the  potato-gathering  style, 
but  now  the  effort  is  made  to  remove  speci- 
mens intact,  often  imbedded  in  large  masses 


READING    RIDDLES   OF  THE   ROCKS      11? 

of  rock,  in  order  that  all  parts  may  be  pre- 
served. 

We  will  take  it  for  granted  that  our  speci- 
mens have  safely  passed  through  all  perils  by 
land  and  water,  road  and  rail ;  that  they  have 
been  quarried,  boxed,  carted  over  a  roadless 
country  to  the  nearest  railway,  and  have  with- 
stood 2,000  miles  of  jolting  in  a  freight-car. 
The  first  step  in  reconstruction  has  been  taken ; 
the  problem,  now  that  the  boxes  are  reposing 
on  the  work-room  floor,  is  to  make  the  blocks 
of  stone  give  up  the  secrets  they  have  guarded 
for  ages,  to  free  the  bones  from  their  envelop- 
ing matrix  in  order  that  they  may  tell  us 
something  of  the  life  of  the  past.  The  method 
of  doing  this  varies  with  the  conditions  under 
which  the  material  has  been  gathered,  and  if 
from  hard  clay,  chalk,  or  shale,  the  process, 
though  tedious  enough  at  best,  is  by  no  means 
so  difficult  as  if  the  specimens  are  imbedded 
in  solid  rock.  In  this  case  the  fragments 
from  a  given  section  of  quarry  must  be  as- 
sembled according  to  the  plan  which  has  been 
carefully  made  as  the  work  of  exhumation 
progressed,  all  pieces  containing  bone  must  be 


118  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

stuck  together,  and  weak  parts  strengthened 
with  gum  or  glue.  Now  the  mass  is  attacked 
with  hammer  and  chisel,  and  the  surrounding 
matrix  slowly  and  carefully  cut  away  until  the 
contained  bone  is  revealed,  a  process  much 
simpler  and  more  expeditious  in  the  telling 
than  in  the  actuality ;  for  the  preparator  may 
not  use  the  heavy  tools  of  the  ordinary  stone- 
cutter :  sometimes  an  awl,  or  even  a  glover's 
needle,  must  suffice  him,  and  the  chips  cut  off 
are  so  small  and  such  care  must  be  taken  not 
to  injure  the  bone  that  the  work  is  really  te- 
dious. This  may,  perhaps,  be  better  appreci- 
ated by  saying  that  to  clean  a  single  vertebra 
of  such  a  huge  Dinosaur  as  Diplodocus  may 
require  a  month  of  continuous  labor,  and  that 
a  score  of  these  big  and  complicated  bones, 
besides  others  of  simpler  structure,  are  in- 
cluded in  the  backbone.  The  finished  speci- 
men weighs  over  120  pounds,  while  as  orig- 
inally collected,  with  all  the  adherent  rock,  the 
weight  was  twice  or  thrice  as  great.  Such  a 
mass  as  this  is  comparatively  small,  and  some- 
times huge  blocks  are  taken  containing  entire 
skulls  or  a  number  of  bones,  and  not  infre- 


READING    RIDDLES   OF  THE   ROCKS      119 

quently  weighing  a  ton.  The  largest  single 
specimen  is  a  skull  of  Triceratops,  collected 
by  Mr.  J.  B.  Hatcher,  which  weighed,  when 
boxed,  3,650  pounds. 

Or,  as  the  result  of  some  mishap,  or  through 
the  work  of  an  inexperienced  collector,  a  valu- 
able specimen  may  arrive  in  the  shape  of  a 
box  full  of  irregular  fragments  of  stone  com- 
pared with  which  a  dissected  map  or  an  old- 
fashioned  Chinese  puzzle  is  simplicity  itself, 
and  one  may  spend  hours  looking  for  some 
piece  whose  proper  location  gives  the  clew  to 
an  entire  section,  and  days,  even,  may  be  con- 
sumed before  the  task  is  completed.  While 
this  not  only  tries  the  patience,  but  the  eyes 
as  well,  there  is,  nevertheless,  a  fascination 
about  this  work  of  fashioning  a  bone  out  of 
scores,  possibly  hundreds,  of  fragments,  and 
watching  the  irregular  bits  of  stone  shaping 
themselves  into  a  mosaic  that  forms  a  portion 
of  some  creature,  possibly  quite  new  to  sci- 
ence, and  destined  to  bear  a  name  as  long  as 
itself.  And  thus,  after  many  days  of  toil,  the 
bone  that  millions  of  years  before  sank  into 
the  mud  of  some  old  lake-bottom  or  was 


120  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

buried  in  the  sandy  shoals  of  an  ancient  river, 
is  brought  to  light  once  more  to  help  tell  the 
tale  of  the  creatures  of  the  past. 

One  bone  might  convey  a  great  deal  of  in- 
formation ;  on  the  other  hand  it  might  reveal 
very  little;  for,  while  it  is  very  painful  to  say 
so,  the  popular  impression  that  it  is  possible  to 
reconstruct  an  animal  from  a  single  bone,  or 
tell  its  size  and  habits  from  a  tooth  is  but 
partially  correct,  and  sometimes  "  the  eminent 
scientist "  has  come  to  grief  even  with  a  great 
many  bones  at  his  disposal.  Did  not  one  of 
the  ablest  anatomists  describe  and  figure  the 
hip-bones  of  a  Dinosaur  as  its  shoulder-blade, 
and  another,  equally  able,  reconstruct  a  reptile 
"  hind  side  before,"  placing  the  head  on  the 
tail !  This  certainly  sounds  absurd  enough ; 
but  just  as  absurd  mistakes  are  made  by  men 
in  other  walks  of  life,  often  with  far  more  de- 
plorable results. 

Before  passing  to  the  restoration  of  the  ex- 
terior of  animals  it  may  be  well  to  say  some- 
thing of  the  manner  in  which  the  skeleton  of 
an  extinct  animal  may  be  reconstructed  and 
the  meaning  of  its  various  parts  interpreted. 


READING    RIDDLES   OF   THE    ROCKS      121 

For  the  adjustment  of  the  muscles  is  depend- 
ent on  the  structure  of  the  skeleton,  and  put- 
ting on  the  muscles  means  blocking  out  the 
form,  details  of  external  appearance  being  sup- 
plied by  the  skin  and  its  accessories  of  hair, 
scales,  or  horns.  Let  us  suppose  in  the  present 
instance  that  we  are  dealing  with  one  of  the 
great  reptiles  known  as  Triceratops  whose  re- 
mains are  among  the  treasures  of  the  National 
Museum  at  Washington,  for  the  reconstruc- 
tion of  the  big  beast  well  illustrates  the  meth- 
ods of  the  palaeontologist  and  also  the  troubles 
by  which  he  is  beset.  Moreover,  this  is  not  a 
purely  imaginary  case,  but  one  that  is  very 
real,  for  the  skeleton  of  this  animal  which  was 
shown  at  Buffalo  was  restored  in  papier-mache' 
in  exactly  the  manner  indicated.  We  have  a 
goodly  number  of  bones,  but  by  no  means  an 
entire  skeleton,  and  yet  we  wish  to  complete 
the  skeleton  and  incidentally  to  form  some 
idea  of  the  creature's  habits.  Now  we  can  in- 
terpret the  past  only  by  a  knowledge  of  the 
present,  and  it  is  by  carefully  studying  the 
skeletons  of  the  animals  of  to-day  that  we  can 
learn  to  read  the  meaning  of  the  symbols  of 


122  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

bones  left  by  the  animals  of  a  million  yester- 
days. Thus  we  find  that  certain  characters 
distinguish  the  bone  of  a  mammal  from  that 
of  a  bird,  a  reptile,  or  a  fish,  and  these  in  turn 
from  one  another,  and  this  constitutes  the 
A  B  C  of  comparative  anatomy.  And,  in  a 
like  manner,  the  bones  of  the  various  divisions 
of  these  main  groups  have  to  a  greater  or  less 
extent  their  own  distinguishing  characteristics, 
so  that  by  first  comparing  the  bones  of  extinct 
animals  with  those  of  creatures  that  are  now 
living  we  are  enabled  to  recognize  their  nearest 
existing  relative,  and  then  by  comparing  them 
with  one  another  we  learn  the  relations  they 
bore  in  the  ancient  world.  But  it  must  be 
borne  in  mind  that  some  of  the  early  beasts 
were  so  very  different  from  those  of  to-day 
that  until  pretty  much  their  entire  structure 
was  known  there  was  nothing  with  which  to 
compare  odd  bones.  Had  but  a  single  incom- 
plete specimen  of  Triceratops  come  to  light 
we  should  be  very  much  in  the  dark  concern- 
ing him  ;  and  although  remains  of  some  thirty 
individuals  have  been  discovered,  these  have 
been  so  imperfect  that  we  are  very  far  from 


READING    RIDDLES   OF   THE    ROCKS      123 

having  all  the  information  we  need.  A  great 
part  of  the  head,  with  its  formidable  looking 
horns,  is  present,  and  although  the  nose  is 
gone,  we  know  from  other  specimens  that  it, 
too,  was  armed  with  a  knob,  or  horn,  and  that 
the  skull  ended  in  a  beak,  something  like  that 
of  a  snapping  turtle,  though  formed  by  a  sep- 
arate and  extra  bone ;  similarly  the  end  of  the 
lower  jaw  is  lacking,  but  we  may  be  pretty 
certain  that  it  ended  in  a  beak,  to  match  that 
of  the  skull.  The  large  leg-bones  of  our  speci- 
men are  mostly  represented,  for  these  being 
among  the  more  solid  parts  of  the  skeleton 
are  more  frequently  preserved  than  any  others, 
and  though  some  are  from  one  side  and  some 
from  another,  this  matters  not.  If  the  hind 
legs  were  disproportionately  long  it  would  in- 
dicate that  our  animal  often  or  habitually 
walked  erect,  but  as  there  is  only  difference 
enough  between  the  fore  and  hind  limbs  to 
enable  Triceratops  to  browse  comfortably  from 
the  ground  we  would  naturally  place  him  on 
all  fours,  even  were  the  skull  not  so  large  as  to 
make  the  creature  too  top-heavy  for  any  other 
mode  of  locomotion.  Were  the  limbs  very 


124  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

small  in  comparison  with  the  other  bones,  it 
would  obviously  mean  that  their  owner  passed 
his  life  in  the  water.  For  a  skeleton  has  a  two- 
fold meaning,  it  is  the  best,  the  most  enduring, 
testimony  we  have  as  to  an  animal's  place  in 
nature  and  the  relationships  it  sustains  to  the 
creatures  that  lived  with  it,  before  it,  and  after 
it.  More  than  this,  a  skeleton  is  the  solution 
of  a  problem  in  mechanics,  the  problem  of 
carrying  a  given  weight  and  of  adaptation  to 
a  given  mode  of  life.  Thus  the  skeleton  varies 
according  as  a  creature  dwells  on  land,  in  the 
water,  or  in  the  air,  and  according  as  it  feeds 
on  grass  or  preys  upon  its  fellows. 

And  so  the  mechanics  of  a  skeleton  afford 
us  a  clew  to  the  habits  of  the  living  animal. 
Something,  too,  may  be  gathered  from  the 
structure  of  the  leg-bones,  for  solid  bones  mean 
either  a  sluggish  animal  or  a  creature  of  more 
or  less  aquatic  habits,  while  hollow  bones  em- 
phatically declare  a  land  animal,  and  an  active 
one  at  that;  and  this,  in  the  case  of  the  Dino- 
saurs, hints  at  predatory  habits,  the  ability  to 
catch  and  eat  their  defenceless  and  more  slug- 
gish brethren.  A  claw,  or,  better  yet,  a  tooth, 


READING    RIDDLES    OF   THE    ROCKS      125 

may  confirm  or  refute  this  hint ;  for  a  blunt  claw 
could  not  be  used  in  tearing  prey  limb  from 
limb,  nor  would  a  double-edged  tooth,  made 
for  rending  flesh,  serve  for  champing  grass. 

But  few  bones  of  the  feet,  and  especially  the 
fore  feet,  are  present,  these  smaller  parts  of  the 
skeleton  having  been  washed  away  before  the 
ponderous  frame  was  buried  in  the  sand,  and 
the  best  that  can  be  done  is  to  follow  the  law 
of  probabilities  and  put  three  toes  on  the  hind 
foot  and  five  on  the  fore,  two  of  these  last 
without  claws.  The  single  blunt  round  claw 
among  our  bones  shows,  as  do  the  teeth,  that 
Triceratops  was  herbivorous  ;  it  also  pointed  a 
little  downward,  and  this  tells  that  in  the  living 
animal  the  sole  of  the  foot  was  a  thick,  soft 
pad,  somewhat  as  it  is  in  the  elephant  and  rhi- 
noceros, and  that  the  toes  were  not  entirely 
free  from  one  another.  There  are  less  than  a 
dozen  vertebrae  and  still  fewer  ribs,  besides 
half  a  barrelful  of  pieces,  from  which  to  recon- 
struct a  backbone  twenty  feet  long.  That  the 
ribs  are  part  from  one  side  and  part  from  an- 
other matters  no  more  than  it  did  in  the  case 
of  the  leg-bones  ;  but  the  backbone  presents  a 


126  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

more  difficult  problem,  since  the  pieces  are  not 
like  so  many  checkers  —  all  made  after  one  pat- 
tern —  but  each  has  an  individuality  of  its  own. 
The  total  number  of  vertebras  must  be  guessed 
at  (perhaps  it  would  sound  better  to  say  esti- 
mated, but  it  really  means  the  same),  and 
knowing  that  some  sections  are  from  the  front 
part  of  the  vertebral  column  and  some  from 
the  back,  we  must  fill  in  the  gaps  as  best  we 
may.  The  ribs  offer  a  little  aid  in  this  task, 
giving  certain  details  of  the  vertebras,  while 
those  in  turn  tell  something  about  the  adjoin- 
ing parts  of  the  ribs.  We  finish  our  Tricera- 
tops  with  a  tail  of  moderate  length,  as  indica- 
ted by  the  rapid  taper  of  the  few  vertebras 
available,  and  from  these  we  gather,  too,  that 
in  life  the  tail  was  round,  and  not  flattened, 
and  that  it  neither  served  for  swimming  nor 
for  a  balancing  pole.  And  so,  little  by  little, 
have  been  pieced  together  the  fragments  from 
which  we  have  derived  our  knowledge  of  the 
past,  and  thus  has  the  palasontologist  read  the 
riddles  of  the  rocks. 

To  make  these   dry   bones  live   again,   to 
clothe  them   with  flesh  and  reconstruct  the 


READING    RIDDLES   OF  THE   ROCKS      127 

creature  as  he  was  or  may  have  been  in  life, 
is,  to  be  honest,  very  largely  guesswork, 
though  to  make  a  guess  that  shall  come  any- 
where near  the  mark  not  only  demands  a 
thorough  knowledge  of  anatomy  —  for  the 
basis  of  all  restoration  must  be  the  skeleton  — 
but  calls  for  more  than  a  passing  acquaintance 
with  the  external  appearance  of  living  animals. 
And  while  there  is  nothing  in  the  bones  to 
tell  how  an  animal  is,  or  was,  clad,  they  will  at 
least  show  to  what  group  the  creature  be- 
longed, and,  that  known,  there  are  certain 
probabilities  in  the  case.  A  bird,  for  example, 
would  certainly  be  clad  in  feathers.  Going  a 
little  farther,  we  might  be  pretty  sure  that 
the  feathers  of  a  water- fowl  would  be  thick 
and  close ;  those  of  strictly  terrestrial  birds, 
such  as  the  ostrich  and  other  flightless  forms, 
lax  and  long.  These  as  general  propositions  ; 
of  course,  in  special  cases,  one  might  easily 
come  to  grief,  as  in  dealing  with  birds  like 
penguins,  which  are  particularly  adapted  for 
an  aquatic  life,  and  have  the  feathers  highly 
modified.  These  birds  depend  upon  their  fat, 
and  not  on  their  feathers,  for  warmth,  and  so 


128  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

their  feathers  have  become  a  sort  of  cross  be- 
tween scales  and  hairs.  Hair  and  fur  belong 
to  mammals  only,  although  these  creatures 
show  much  variety  in  their  outer  covering. 
The  thoroughly  marine  whales  have  discarded 
furs  and  adopted  a  smooth  and  slippery  skin,* 
well  adapted  to  movement  through  the  water, 
relying  for  warmth  on  a  thick  undershirt  of 
blubber.  The  earless  seals  that  pass  much  of 
their  time  on  the  ice  have  just  enough  hair 
to  keep  them  from  absolute  contact  with  it, 
warmth  again  being  provided  for  by  blubber. 
The  fur  seals,  which  for  several  months  in  the 
year  dwell  largely  on  land,  have  a  coat  of  fur 
and  hair,  although  warmth  is  mostly  furnished, 
or  rather  kept  in,  by  fat. 

No  reptile,  therefore,  would  be  covered  with 

*  The  reader  is  named  that  this  is  a  mere  Jigure  of  speech, 
for,  of  course,  the  process  of  adaptation  to  surroundings  is 
passive,  not  active,  although  there  is  a  most  unfortunate  ten- 
dency among  writers  on  evolution,  and  particularly  on  mimicry, 
to  speak  of  it  as  active.  The  writer  believes  that  no  animal 
in  the  first  stages  of  mimicry,  consciously  mimics  or  endeav- 
ors to  resemble  another  animal  or  any  part  of  its  surround- 
ings, but  a  habit  at  Jlrst  accidental  may  in  time  become 
more  or  less  conscious. 


READING    RIDDLES   OF   THE    ROCKS      129 

feathers,  neither,  judging  from  those  we 
know  to-day,  would  they  be  clad  in  fur  or 
hair;  but,  such  coverings  being  barred  out, 
there  remain  a  great  variety  of  plates  and 
scales  to  choose  from.  Folds  and  frills,  crests 
and  dewlaps,  like  beauty,  are  but  skin  deep, 
and,  being  thus  superficial,  ordinarily  leave  no 
trace  of  their  former  presence,  and  in  respect 
to  them  the  reconstructor  must  trust  to  his 
imagination,  with  the  law  of  probabilities  as  a 
check  rein  to  his  fancy.  This  law  would  tell  us 
that  such  ornaments  must  not  be  so  placed  as 
to  be  in  the  way,  and  that  while  there  would  be 
a  possibility  —  one  might  even  say  probability 
—  of  the  great,  short-headed,  iguana-like 
Dinosaurs  having  dewlaps,  that  there  would 
be  no  great  likelihood  of  their  possessing  ruffs 
such  as  that  of  the  Australian  Chlamydosau- 
rus  (mantled  lizard)  to  flap  about  their  ears. 
Even  Stegosaurus,  with  his  bizarre  array  of 
great  plates  and  spines,  kept  them  on  his 
back,  out  of  the  way.  Such  festal  ornamen- 
tation would,  however,  more  likely  be  found  in 
small,  active  creatures,  the  larger  beasts  con- 
tenting themselves  with  plates  and  folds. 


130  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

Spines  and  plates  usually  leave  some  trace 
of  their  existence,  for  they  consist  of  a  super- 
structure of  skin  or  horn,  built  on  a  founda- 
tion of  bone  ;  and  while  even  horn  decom- 
poses too  quickly  to  "  petrify,"  the  bone  will 
become  fossilized  and  changed  into  enduring 
stone.  But  while  this  affords  a  pretty  sure 
guide  to  the  general  shape  of  the  investing 
horn,  it  does  not  give  all  the  details,  and  there 
may  have  been  ridges  and  furrows  and  sculpt- 
uring that  we  know  not  of. 

Knowing,  then,  what  the  probabilities  are,  we 
have  some  guide  to  the  character  of  the  cover- 
ing that  should  be  placed  on  an  animal,  and  if 
we  may  not  be  sure  as  to  what  should  be  done, 
we  may  be  pretty  certain  what  should  not. 

For  example,  to  depict  a  Dinosaur  with 
smooth,  rubbery  hide  walking  about  on  dry 
land  would  be  to  violate  the  probabilities,  for 
only  such  exclusively  aquatic  creatures  as  the 
whales  among  mammals,  and  the  salamanders 
among  batrachians,  are  clothed  in  smooth, 
shiny  skin.  There  might,  however,  be  reason 
to  suspect  that  a  creature  largely  aquatic  in  its 
habits  did  occasionally  venture  on  land,  as,  for 


READING    RIDDLES   OF   THE    ROCKS      131 

instance,  when  vertebrae  that  seem  illy  adapted 
for  carrying  the  weight  of  a  land  animal  are 
found  in  company  with  huge  limb-bones  and 
massive  feet  we  may  feel  reasonably  certain 
that  their  owner  passed  at  least  a  portion  of  his 
time  on  terra  fir  ma. 

So  much  for  the  probabilities  as  to  the  cov- 
ering of  animals  known  to  us  only  by  their  fos- 
sil remains ;  but  it  is  often  possible  to  go  be- 
yond this,  and  to  state  certainly  how  they  were 
clad.  For  while  the  chances  are  small  that 
any  trace  of  the  covering  of  an  extinct  animal, 
other  than  bony  plates,  will  be  preserved,  Nat- 
ure does  now  and  then  seem  to  have  relented, 
and  occasionally  some  animal  settled  to  rest 
where  it  was  so  quickly  and  quietly  covered 
with  fine  mud  that  the  impression  of  small 
scales,  feathers,  or  even  smooth  skin,  was  pre- 
served ;  curiously  enough,  there  seems  to  be 
scarcely  any  record  of  the  imprint  of  hair. 
Then,  too,  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  while 
the  chances  were  very  much  against  such  pres- 
ervation, in  the  thousands  or  millions  of  times 
creatures  died  the  millionth  chance  might  come 
uppermost. 


132  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

Silhouettes  of  those  marine  reptiles,  the  Ich- 
thyosaurs,  have  been  found,  probably  made  by 
the  slow  carbonization  of  animal  matter,  show- 
ing not  only  the  form  of  the  body  and  tail,  but 
revealing  the  existence  of  an  unsuspected  back 
fin.  And  yet  these  animals  were  apparently 
clad  in  a  skin  as  thin  and  smooth  as  that  of  a 
whale.  Impressions  of  feathers  were  known 
long  before  the  discovery  of  Archaeopteryx  ;  a 
few  have  been  found  in  the  Green  River  and 
Florissant  shales  of  Wyoming,  and  a  Hesper- 
ornis  in  the  collection  of  the  State  University 
of  Kansas  shows  traces  of  the  existence  of 
long,  soft  feathers  on  the  legs  and  very  clear 
imprints  of  the  scales  and  reticulated  skin  that 
covered  the  tarsus.  From  the  Chalk  of  Kan- 
sas, too,  came  the  example  of  Tylosaur,  show- 
ing that  the  back  of  this  animal  was  decorated 
with  the  crest  shown  in  Mr.  Knight's  restora- 
tion, one  not  unlike  that  of  the  modern  iguana. 
From  the  Laramie  sandstone  of  Montana  Mr. 
Hatcher  and  Mr.  Butler  have  obtained  the  im- 
pressions of  portions  of  the  skin  of  the  great 
Dinosaur,  Thespesius,  which  show  that  the 
covering  of  this  animal  consisted  largely,  if  not 


READING    RIDDLES   OF   THE   ROCKS      133 

entirely,  of  small,  irregularly  hexagonal  horny 
scutes,  slightly  thickened  in  the  centre.  The 
quarries  of  lithographic  stone  at  Solenhofen 
have  yielded  a  few  specimens  of  flying  reptiles, 
pterodactyls,  which  not  only  verify  the  correct- 
ness of  the  inference  that  these  creatures  pos- 
sessed membranous  wings,  like  the  bats,  but 
show  the  exact  shape,  and  it  was  sometimes 
very  curious,  of  this  membrane.  And  each  and 
all  of  these  wonderfully  preserved  specimens 
serve  both  to  check  and  guide  the  restorer 
in  his  task  of  clothing  the  animal  as  it  was  in 
life. 

And  all  this  help  is  needed,  for  it  is  an  easy 
matter  to  make  a  wide-sweeping  deduction, 
apparently  resting  on  a  good  basis  of  fact,  and 
yet  erroneous.  Remains  of  the  Mammoth 
and  Woolly  Rhinoceros,  found  in  Siberia  and 
Northern  Europe,  were  thought  to  indicate 
that  at  the  period  when  these  animals  lived 
the  climate  was  mild,  a  very  natural  inference, 
since  the  elephants  and  rhinoceroses  we  now 
know  are  all  inhabitants  of  tropical  climes. 
But  the  discovery  of  more  or  less  complete 
specimens  makes  it  evident  that  the  climate 


134  ANIMALS  OF  THE   PAST 

was  not  particularly  mild;  the  animals  were 
simply  adapted  to  it ;  instead  of  being  naked 
like  their  modern  relatives,  they  were  dressed 
for  the  climate  in  a  woolly  covering.  We 
think  of  the  tiger  as  prowling  through  the 
jungles  of  India,  but  he  ranges  so  far  north 
that  in  some  localities  this  beast  preys  upon 
reindeer,  which  are  among  the  most  northern 
of  large  mammals,  and  there  the  tiger  is  clad 
in  fairly  thick  fur. 

When  we  come  to  coloring  a  reconstructed 
animal  we  have  absolutely  no  guide,  unless  we 
assume  that  the  larger  a  creature  the  more  so- 
berly will  it  be  colored.  The  great  land  ani- 
mals of  to-day,  the  elephant  and  rhinoceros,  to 
say  nothing  of  the  aquatic  hippopotamus,  are 
very  dully  colored,  and  while  this  sombre  col- 
oration is  to-day  a  protection,  rendering  these 
animals  less  easily  seen  by  man  than  they 
otherwise  would  be,  yet  at  the  time  this  color 
was  developing  man  was  not  nor  were  there 
enemies  sufficiently  formidable  to  menace  the 
race  of  elephantine  creatures. 

For  where  mere  size  furnishes  sufficient  pro- 
tection one  would  hardly  expect  to  find  pro- 


READING    RIDDLES   OF   THE    ROCKS      135 

tective  coloration  as  well,  unless  indeed  a 
creature  preyed  upon  others,  when  it  might  be 
advantageous  to  enable  a  predatory  animal  to 
steal  upon  its  prey. 

Color  often  exists  (or  is  supposed  to)  as  a 
sexual  characteristic,  to  render  the  male  of  a 
species  attractive  to,  or  readily  recognizable 
by,  the  female,  but  in  the  case  of  large  animals 
mere  size  is  quite  enough  to  render  them  con- 
spicuous, and  possibly  this  may  be  one  of  the 
factors  in  the  dull  coloration  of  large  animals. 

So  while  a  green  and  yellow  Triceratops 
would  undoubtedly  have  been  a  conspicuous 
feature  in  the  Cretaceous  landscape,  from  what 
we  know  of  existing  animals  it  seems  best  to 
curb  our  fancy  and,  so  far  as  large  Dinosaurs 
are  concerned,  employ  the  colors  of  a  Rem- 
brandt rather  than  those  of  a  sign  painter. 

Aids,  or  at  least  hints,  to  the  coloration  of 
extinct  animals  are  to  be  found  in  the  colora- 
tion of  the  young  of  various  living  species,  for 
as  the  changes  undergone  by  the  embryo  are 
in  a  measure  an  epitome  of  the  changes  under- 
gone by  a  species  during  its  evolution,  so  the 
brief  color  phases  or  markings  of  the  young 


136  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

are  considered  to  represent  the  ordinary  color- 
ing of  distant  ancestors.  Young  thrushes  are 
spotted,  young  ostriches  and  grebes  are  irreg- 
ularly striped,  young  lions  are  spotted,  and  in 
restoring  the  early  horse,  or  Hyracothere,  Pro- 
fessor Osborn  had  the  animal  represented  as 
faintly  striped,  for  the  reason  that  zebras,  the 
wild  horses  of  to-day,  are  striped,  and  because 
the  ass,  which  is  a  primitive  type  of  horse,  is 
striped  over  the  shoulders,  these  being  hints 
that  the  earlier  horse-like  forms  were  also 
striped. 

Thus  just  as  the  skeleton  of  a  Dinosaur  may 
be  a  composite  structure,  made  up  of  the 
bones  of  a  dozen  individuals,  and  these  in  turn 
mosaics  of  many  fragments,  so  may  the  sem- 
blance of  the  living  animal  be  based  on  a  fact, 
pieced  out  with  a  probability  and  completed 
by  a  bit  of  theory. 

REFERENCES 

There  is  a  large  series  of  restorations  of  extinct  ani- 
mals, prepared  by  Mr.  Charles  R.  Knight,  under  the 
direction  of  Professor  Osborn,  in  the  Hall  of  Palaeon- 
tology of  the  American  Museum  of  Natural  History, 


READING    RIDDLES   OF   THE    ROCKS      137 

and  these  are  later  to  be  reproduced  and  issued  in  port- 
folio form. 

Should  the  reader  visit  Princeton,  he  may  see  in  the 
museum  there  a  number  of  B.  Waterhouse  Hawkins's 
creations  —  creations  is  the  proper  word  —  which  are  of 
interest  as  examples  of  the  early  work  in  this  line. 

The  "Report  of  the  Smithsonian  Institution  for 
1900 "  contains  an  article  on  "  The  Restoration  of 
Extinct  Animals?  pages  lfl9-J$°2)  which  includes  a 
number  of  plates  showing  the  progress  that  has  been 
made  in  this  direction. 


Fig.  27.  —  A  Hint  of  Buried  Treasures. 


VIII 

FEATHERED   GIANTS 

"There  were  giants  in  the  earth  in  those  days." 

Nearly  every  group  of  animals  has  its  giants, 
its  species  which  tower  above  their  fellows  as 
Goliath  of  Gath  stood  head  and  shoulders 
above  the  Philistine  hosts  ;  and  while  some  of 
these  are  giants  only  in  comparison  with  their 
fellows,  belonging  to  families  whose  members 
are  short  of  stature,  others  are  sufficiently 
great  to  be  called  giants  under  any  circum- 
stances. Some  of  these  giants  live  to-day, 
some  have  but  recently  passed  away,  and  some 
ceased  to  be  long  ages  before  man  trod  this 
earth.  The  most  gigantic  of  mammals  —  the 
whales  —  still  survive,  and  the  elephant  of  to- 
day suffers  but  little  in  comparison  with  the 
mammoth  of  yesterday  ;  the  monstrous  Dino- 
saurs, greatest  of  all  reptiles  —  greatest,  in 
fact,  of  all  animals  that  have  walked  the 

138 


FEATHERED  GIANTS  139 

earth  —  flourished  thousands  upon  thousands 
of  years  ago.  As  for  birds,  some  of  the  giants 
among  them  are  still  living,  some  existed  long 
geologic  periods  ago,  and  a  few  have  so  re- 
cently vanished  from  the  scene  that  their 
memory  still  lingers  amid  the  haze  of  tradition. 
The  best  known  among  these,  as  well  as  the 
most  recent  in  point  of  time,  are  the  Moas  of 
New  Zealand,  first  brought  to  notice  by  the 
Rev.  W.  Colenso,  later  on  Bishop  of  New 
Zealand,  one  of  the  many  missionaries  to 
whom  Science  is  under  obligations.  Early  in 
1838,  Bishop  Colenso,  while  on  a  missionary 
visit  to  the  East  Cape  region,  heard  from  the 
natives  of  Waiapu  tales  of  a  monstrous  bird, 
called  Moa,  having  the  head  of  a  man,  that 
inhabited  the  mountain-side  some  eighty  miles 
away.  This  mighty  bird,  the  last  of  his  race, 
was  said  to  be  attended  by  two  equally  huge 
lizards  that  kept  guard  while  he  slept,  and  on 
the  approach  of  man  wakened  the  Moa,  who 
immediately  rushed  upon  the  intruders  and 
trampled  them  to  death.  None  of  the  Maoris 
had  seen  this  bird,  but  they  had  seen  and 
somewhat  irreverently  used  for  making  parts 


140  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

of  their  fishing  tackle,  bones  of  its  extinct  rel- 
atives, and  these  bones  they  declared  to  be  as 
large  as  those  of  an  ox. 

About  the  same  time  another  missionary, 
the  Rev.  Richard  Taylor,  found  a  bone  ascribed 
to  the  Moa,  and  met  with  a  very  similar  tradi- 
tion among  the  natives  of  a  near-by  district, 
only,  as  the  foot  of  the  rainbow  moves  away 
as  we  move  toward  it,  in  his  case  the  bird  was 
said  to  dwell  in  quite  a  different  locality  from 
that  given  by  the  natives  of  East  Cape.  While, 
however,  the  Maoris  were  certain  that  the 
Moa  still  lived,  and  to  doubt  its  existence  was 
little  short  of  a  crime,  no  one  had  actually  seen 
it,  and  as  time  went  on  and  the  bird  still  re- 
mained unseen  by  any  explorer,  hope  became 
doubt  and  doubt  certainty,  until  it  even  be- 
came a  mooted  question  whether  such  a  bird 
had  existed  within  the  past  ten  centuries,  to 
say  nothing  of  having  lived  within  the  mem- 
ory of  man. 

But  if  we  do  not  know  the  living  birds,  their 
remains  are  scattered  broadcast  over  hillside 
and  plain,  concealed  in  caves,  buried  in  the 
mud  of  swamps,  and  from  these  we  gain  a  good 


FEATHERED   GIANTS  141 

idea  of  their  size  and  structure,  while  chance 
has  even  made  it  possible  to  know  something 
of  their  color  and  general  appearance.  This 
chance  was  the  discovery  of  a  few  specimens, 
preserved  in  exceptionally  dry  caves  on  the 
South  Island,  which  not  only  had  some  of  the 
bones  still  united  by  ligaments,  but  patches  of 
skin  clinging  to  the  bones,  and  bearing  numer- 
ous feathers  of  a  chestnut  color  tipped  with 
white.  These  small,  straggling,  rusty  feathers 
are  not  much  to  look  at,  but  when  we  reflect 
that  they  have  been  preserved  for  centuries 
without  any  care  whatever,  while  the  buffalo 
bugs  have  devoured  our  best  Smyrna  rugs  in 
spite  of  all  possible  precautions,  our  respect  for 
them  increases. 

From  the  bones  we  learn  that  there  were  a 
great  many  kinds  of  Moas,  twenty  at  least, 
ranging  in  size  from  those  little  larger  than  a 
turkey  to  that  giant  among  giants,  Dinornis 
maximus,  which  stood  at  least  ten  feet  high,* 

*  The  height  of  the  Moas,  and  even  of  some  species  of 
JEpyornis,  is  often  stated  to  be  twelve  or  fourteen  feet,  but  such 
a  height  can  only  be  obtained  by  placing  the  skeleton  in  a  wholly 
unnatural  attitude. 


142  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

or  two  feet  higher  than  the  largest  ostrich,  and 
may  well  claim  the  distinction  of  being  the 
tallest  of  all  known  birds.  We  also  learn  from 
the  bones  that  not  only  were  the  Moas  flight- 
less, but  that  many  of  them  were  absolutely 
wingless,  being  devoid  even  of  such  vestiges  of 
wings  as  we  find  in  the  Cassowary  or  Apteryx. 
But  if  Nature  deprived  these  birds  of  wings, 
she  made  ample  amends  in  the  matter  of  legs, 
those  of  some  species,  the  Elephant-footed 
Moa,  Pachyornis  elephantopus,  for  example, 
being  so  massively  built  as  to  cause  one  to 
wonder  what  the  owner  used  them  for,  al- 
though the  generally  accepted  theory  is  that 
they  were  used  for  scratching  up  the  roots  of 
ferns  on  which  the  Moas  are  believed  to  have 
fed.  And  if  a  blow  from  an  irate  ostrich  is 
sufficient  to  fell  a  man,  what  must  have  been 
the  kicking  power  of  an  able-bodied  Moa? 
Beside  this  bird  the  ostrich  would  appear  as 
slim  and  graceful  as  a  gazelle  beside  a  prize  ox. 
The  Moas  were  confined  to  New  Zealand, 
some  species  inhabiting  the  North  Island,  some 
the  South,  very  few  being  common  to  both, 
and  from  these  peculiarities  of  distribution 


FEATHERED   GIANTS  143 

geologists  deduce  that  at  some  early  period  in 
the  history  of  the  earth  the  two  islands  formed 
one,  that  later  on  the  land  subsided,  leaving 
the  islands  separated  by  a  strait,  and  that  since 
this  subsidence  there  has  been  sufficient  time 
for  the  development  of  the  species  peculiar  to 
each  island.  Although  Moas  were  still  nu- 
merous when  man  made  his  appearance  in  this 
part  of  the  world,  the  large  deposits  of  their 
bones  indicate  that  they  were  on  the  wane,  and 
that  natural  causes  had  already  reduced  the 
feathered  population  of  these  islands.  A  gla- 
cial period  is  believed  to  have  wrought  their 
destruction,  and  in  one  great  morass,  abound- 
ing in  springs,  their  bones  occur  in  such  enor- 
mous numbers,  layer  upon  layer,  that  it  is 
thought  the  birds  sought  the  place  where  the 
flowing  springs  might  afford  their  feet  at  least 
some  respite  from  the  biting  cold,  and  there 
perished  miserably  by  thousands. 

What  Nature  spared  man  finished,  and 
legends  of  Moa  hunts  and  Moa  feasts  still  lin- 
gered among  the  Maoris  when  the  white  man 
came  and  began  in  turn  the  extermination  of 
the  Maori.  The  theory  has  been  advanced, 


144  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

with  much  to  support  it,  that  the  big  birds 
were  eaten  off  the  face  of  the  earth  by  an  ear- 
lier race  than  the  Maoris,  and  that  after  the 
extirpation  of  the  Moas  the  craving  for  flesh 
naturally  led  to  cannibalism.  But  by  whom- 
soever the  destruction  was  wrought,  the  result 
was  the  same,  the  habitat  of  these  feathered 
giants  knew  them  no  longer,  while  multitudes 
of  charred  bones,  interspersed  with  fragments 
of  eggshells,  bear  testimony  to  former  barbaric 
feasts. 

It  is  a  far  cry  from  New  Zealand  to  Mada- 
gascar, but  thither  must  we  go,  for  that  island 
was,  pity  we  cannot  say  is,  inhabited  by  a 
race  of  giant  birds  from  whose  eggs  it  has  been 
thought  may  have  been  hatched  the  Roc  of 
Sindbad.  Arabian  tales,  as  we  all  know,  lo- 
cate the  Roc  either  in  Madagascar  or  in  some 
adjacent  island  to  the  north  and  east,  and  it  is 
far  from  unlikely  that  legends  of  the  ^Epyor- 
nis,  backed  by  the  substantial  proof  of  its 
enormous  eggs,  may  have  been  the  slight 
foundation  of  fact  whereon  the  story-teller 
erected  his  structure  of  fiction.  True,  the  Roc 
of  fable  was  a  gigantic  bird  of  prey  capable  of 


FEATHERED  GIANTS  145 

bearing  away  an  elephant  in  its  talons,  while 
the  JEpyornis  has  shed  its  wings  and  shrunk 
to  dimensions  little  larger  than  an  ostrich,  but 
this  is  the  inevitable  result  of  closer  acquaint- 
ance and  the  application  of  a  two-foot  rule. 

Like  the  Moa  the  ^Epyornis  seems  to  have 
lived  in  tradition  long  after  it  became  extinct, 
for  a  French  history  of  Madagascar,  published 
as  early  as  1658  makes  mention  of  a  large  bird, 
or  kind  of  ostrich,  said  to  inhabit  the  southern 
end  of  the  island.  Still,  in  spite  of  bones  hav- 
ing been  found  that  bear  evident  traces  of  the 
handiwork  of  man,  it  is  possible  that  this  and 
other  reports  were  due  to  the  obvious  necessity 
of  having  some  bird  to  account  for  the  pres- 
ence of  the  eggs. 

The  actual  introduction  of  the  ^Epyornis  to 
science  took  place  in  1834,  when  a  French 
traveller  sent  Jules  Verreaux,  the  ornithologist, 
a  sketch  of  a  huge  egg,  saying  that  he  had 
seen  two  of  that  size,  one  sawed  in  twain  to 
make  bowls,  the  other,  traversed  by  a  stick, 
serving  in  the  preparation  of  rice  uses  some- 
what in  contrast  with  the  proverbial  fragility 
of  egg-shells.  A  little  later  another  traveller 


146  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

procured  some  fragments  of  egg-shells,  but  it 
was  not  until  1851  that  any  entire  eggs  were 
obtained,  when  two  were  secured,  and  with  a 
few  bones  sent  to  France,  where  Geoffroy  St. 
Hilaire  bestowed  upon  them  the  name  of 
jEpyornis  maximus  (the  greatest  lofty  bird). 
Maximus  the  eggs  remain,  for  they  still  hold 
the  record  for  size  ;  but  so  far  as  the  bird  that 
is  supposed  to  have  laid  them  is  concerned,  the 
name  was  a  little  premature,  for  other  and 
larger  species  subsequently  came  to  hand. 
Between  the  ^Epyornithes  and  the  Moas  Sci- 
ence has  had  a  hard  time,  for  the  supply  of  big 
words  was  not  large  enough  to  go  around,  and 
some  had  to  do  duty  twice.  In  the  way  of 
generic  names  we  have  Dinornis,  terrible  bird  ; 
^Epyornis,  high  bird  ;  Pachyornis,  stout  bird  ; 
and  Brontornis,  thunder  bird,  while  for  specific 
names  there  are  robustus,  maximus,  titan ; 
gravis,  heavy ;  immanis,  enormous ;  crassus, 
stout ;  ingens,  great ;  and  elephantopus,  ele- 
phant-footed —  truly  a  goodly  array  of  large- 
sounding  words.  But  to  return  to  the  big 
eggs  !  Usually  we  look  upon  those  of  the  os- 
trich as  pretty  large,  but  an  ostrich  egg  meas- 


FEATHERED   GIANTS  147 

ures  4J  by  6  inches,  while  that  of  the  ^Epyor- 
nis  is  9  by  13  inches ;  or,  to  put  it  another 
way,  it  would  hold  the  contents  of  six  ostrichs' 
eggs,  or  one  hundred  and  forty-eight  hens'  eggs, 
or  thirty  thousand  humming  birds'  eggs ;  and 
while  this  is  very  much  smaller  than  a  water- 
butt,  it  is  still  as  large  as  a  bucket,  and  one  or 
two  such  eggs  might  suffice  to  make  an  omelet 
for  Gargantua  himself. 

The  size  of  an  egg  is  no  safe  criterion  of  the 
size  of  the  bird  that  laid  it,  for  a  large  bird 
may  lay  a  small  egg,  or  a  small  bird  a  large 
one.  Comparing  the  egg  of  the  great  Moa 
with  that  of  our  ^Epyornis  one  might  think 
the  latter  much  the  larger  bird,  say  twelve  feet 
in  height,  when  the  facts  in  the  case  are  that 
while  there  was  no  great  difference  in  the 
weight  of  the  two,  that  difference,  and  a  su- 
periority of  at  least  two  feet  in  height,  are  in 
favor  of  the  bird  that  laid  the  smaller  egg. 
The  record  of  large  eggs,  however,  belongs  to 
the  Apteryx,  a  New  Zealand  bird  smaller 
than  a  hen,  though  distantly  related  to  the 
Moas,  which  lays  an  egg  about  one-third  of 
its  own  weight,  measuring  3  by  5  inches ;  per- 


148  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

haps  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  the  bird 
lays  but  two. 

Although  most  of  the  eggs  of  these  big 
birds  that  have  been  found  have  literally  been 
unearthed  from  the  muck  of  swamps,  now  and 
then  one  comes  to  light  in  a  more  interesting 
manner  as,  for  example,  when  a  perfect  egg  of 
^Epyornis  was  found  afloat  after  a  hurricane, 
bobbing  serenely  up  and  down  with  the  waves 
near  St.  Augustine's  Bay,  or  when  an  egg  of 
the  Moa  was  exhumed  from  an  ancient  Maori 
grave,  where  for  years  it  had  lain  unharmed, 
safely  clasped  between  the  skeleton  fingers  of 
the  occupant.  So  far  very  few  of  these  huge 
eggs  have  made  their  way  to  this  country,  and 
the  only  egg  of  ^Epyornis  now  on  this  side  of 
the  water  is  the  property  of  a  private  individual. 

Most  recent  in  point  of  discovery,  but  oldest 
in  point  of  time,  are  the  giant  birds  from  Pata- 
gonia, which  are  burdened  with  the  name  of 
Phororhacidse,  a  name  that  originated  in  an 
error,  although  the  error  may  well  be  excused. 
The  first  fragment  of  one  of  these  great  birds 
to  come  to  light  was  a  portion  of  the  lower 
jaw,  and  this  was  so  massive,  so  un-bird-like, 


FEATHERED  GIANTS  149 

that  the  finder  dubbed  it  Phororhacos,  and  so 
it  must  remain. 

It  is  a  pity  that  all  the  large  names  were 
used  up  before  this  group  of  birds  was  discov- 
ered, and  it  is  particularly  unfortunate  that 
Dinornis,  terrible  bird,  was  applied  to  the  root- 
eating  Moas,  for  these  Patagonian  birds,  with 
their  massive  limbs,  huge  heads  and  hooked 
beaks,  were  truly  worthy  of  such  a  name  ;  and 
although  in  nowise  related  to  the  eagles,  they 
may  in  habit  have  been  terrestrial  birds  of  prey. 
Not  all  the  members  of  this  family  are  giants, 
for  as  in  other  groups,  some  are  big  and  some 
little,  but  the  largest  among  them  might  be 
styled  the  Daniel  Lambert  of  the  feathered 
race.  Brontornis,  for  example,  the  thunder 
bird,  or  as  the  irreverent  translate  it,  the  thun- 
dering big  bird,  had  leg-bones  larger  than  those 
of  an  ox,  the  drumstick  measuring  30  inches  in 
length  by  2j  inches  in  diameter,  or  4J  inches 
across  the  ends,  while  the  tarsus,  or  lower  bone 
of  the  leg  to  which  the  toes  are  attached,  was 
16 \  inches  long  and  5j  inches  wide  where  the 
toes  join  on.  Bear  this  in  mind  the  next  time 
you  see  a  large  turkey,  or  compare  these  bones 


150  ANIMALS    OF   THE    PAST 

with  those  of  an  ostrich  :  but  lest  you  may  for- 
get, it  may  be  said  that  the  same  bone  of  a 
fourteen-pound  turkey  is  5j  inches  long,  and 
one  inch  wide  at  either  end,  while  that  of  an 
ostrich  measures  19  inches  long  and  2  inches 
across  the  toes,  or  3  at  the  upper  end. 

If  Brontornis  was  a  heavy-limbed  bird,  he 
was  not  without  near  rivals  among  the  Moas, 
while  the  great  Phororhacos,  one  of  his  con- 
temporaries, was  not  only  nearly  as  large,  but 
quite  unique  in  build.  Imagine  a  bird  seven 
or  eight  feet  in  height  from  the  sole  of  his  big, 
sharp-clawed  feet,  to  the  top  of  his  huge  head, 
poise  this  head  on  a  neck  as  thick  as  that  of  a 
horse,  arm  it  with  a  beak  as  sharp  as  an  ice- 
pick and  almost  as  formidable,  and  you  have  a 
fair  idea  of  this  feathered  giant  of  the  ancient 
pampas.  The  head  indeed  was  truly  colossal 
for  that  of  a  bird,  measuring  23  inches  in 
length  by  7  in  depth,  while  that  of  the  race- 
horse Lexington,  and  he  was  a  good-sized 
horse,  measures  22  inches  long  by  5j  inches 
deep.  The  depth  of  the  jaw  is  omitted  be- 
cause we  wish  to  make  as  good  a  case  as  possi- 
ble for  the  bird,  and  the  jaw  of  a  horse  is  so 


FEATHERED   GIANTS 


151 


deep  as  to  give  him  an  undue  advantage  in  that 
respect. 

We  can  only  speculate  on  the  food  of  these 
great  birds,  and  for  aught  we  know  to  the 
contrary  they  may  have  caught  fish,  fed  upon 
carrion,  or  used  their  powerful  feet  and  huge 


Fig.  30.  — Skull  of  Phororhacos  Compared  with  that  of 
the  Race-horse  Lexington. 

beaks  for  grubbing  roots  ;  but  if  they  were  not 
more  or  less  carnivorous,  preying  upon  such 
reptiles,  mammals  and  other  birds  as  came 
within  reach,  then  nature  apparently  made  a 
mistake  in  giving  them  such  a  formidable 
equipment  of  beak  and  claw.  So  far  as  habits 


152 


ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

go  we  might  be 
justified  in  calling 
them  cursorial 
birds  of  prey. 

We  really  know 
very  little  about 
these  Patagonian 
giants,  but  they 
are  interesting  not 
only  from  their 
great  size  and  as- 
tounding skulls, 
but  because  of  the 
early  age  (Mio- 
cene) at  which 
they  lived  and  be- 
cause in  spite  of 
their  bulk  they  are 
in  nowise  related 
to  the  ostriches, 
but  belong  near 
the  heron  family. 
As  usual,  we  have 
no  idea  why  they 
became  extinct, 


Fig.  31. — Leg  of  a  Horse  Com- 
pared with  that  of  the  Giant  Moa. 


FEATHERED   GIANTS  153 

but  in  this  instance  man  is  guiltless,  for  they 
lived  and  died  long  before  he  made  his  ap- 
pearance, and  the  ever-convenient  hypothesis 
"  change  of  climate  "  may  be  responsible  for 
their  disappearance. 

Something,  perhaps,  remains  to  be  said  con- 
cerning the  causes  which  seem  to  have  led  to 
the  development  of  these  giant  birds,  as  well 
as  the  reasons  for  their  flightless  condition  and 
peculiar  distribution,  for  it  will  be  noticed 
that,  with  the  exception  of  the  African  and 
South  American  ostriches  the  great  flightless 
birds  as  a  rule  are,  and  were,  confined  to  unin- 
habited or  sparsely  populated  islands,  and  this 
is  equally  true  of  the  many  small,  but  equally 
flightless  birds.  It  is  a  seemingly  harsh  law 
of  nature  that  all  living  beings  shall  live  in  a 
more  or  less  active  struggle  with  each  other 
and  with  their  surroundings,  and  that  those 
creatures  which  possess  some  slight  advantage 
over  their  fellows  in  the  matter  of  speed,  or 
strength,  or  ability  to  adapt  themselves  to  sur- 
rounding conditions,  shall  prosper  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  others.  In  the  power  of  flight, 
birds  have  a  great  safeguard  against  changes  of 


154  ANIMALS    OF   THE    PAST 

climate  with  their  accompanying  variations  in 
the  supply  of  food,  and,  to  a  lesser  extent, 
against  their  various  enemies,  including  man. 
This  power  of  flight,  acquired  early  in  their 
geological  history,  has  enabled  birds  to  spread 
over  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  globe  as  no 
other  group  of  animals  has  done,  and  to  thrive 
under  the  most  varying  conditions,  and  it 
would  seem  that  if  this  power  were  lost  it 
must  sooner  or  later  work  harm.  Now  to-day 
we  find  no  great  wingless  birds  in  thickly 
populated  regions,  or  where  beasts  of  prey 
abound  ;  the  ostriches  roam  the  desert  wastes 
of  Arabia,  Africa  and  South  America  where 
men  are  few  and  savage  beasts  scarce,  and 
against  these  is  placed  a  fleetness  of  foot  inher- 
ited from  ancestors  who  acquired  it  before 
man  was.  The  heavy  cassowaries  dwell  in  the 
thinly  inhabited,  thickly  wooded  islands  of 
Malaysia,  where  again  there  are  no  large  carni- 
vores and  where  the  dense  vegetation  is  some 
safeguard  against  man ;  the  emu  comes  from 
the  Australian  plains,  where  also  there  are  no 
four-footed  enemies  *  and  where  his  ancestors 

*  The  dingo,  or  native  dog,  is  not  forgotten,  but,  like  man, 
it  w  a  comparatively  recent  animal. 


FEATHERED   GIANTS  155 

dwelt  in  peace  before  the  advent  of  man. 
And  the  same  things  are  true  of  the  Moas,  the 
vEpyornithes,  the  flightless  birds  of  Patagonia, 
the  recent  dodo  of  Mauritius  and  the  solitaire 
of  Rodriguez,  each  and  all  of  which  flourished 
in  places  where  there  were  no  men  and  prac- 
tically no  other  enemies.  Hence  we  deduce 
that  absence  of  enemies  is  the  prime  factor  in 
the  existence  of  flightless  birds,*  although 
presence  of  food  is  an  essential,  while  isolation, 
or  restriction  to  a  limited  area,  plays  an  im- 
portant part  by  keeping  together  those  birds, 
or  that  race  of  birds,  whose  members  show  a 
tendency  to  disuse  their  wings.  It  will  be 
seen  that  such  combinations  of  circumstances 
will  most  naturally  be  found  on  islands  whose 
geological  history  is  such  that  they  have  had 
no  connection  with  adjacent  continents,  or 
such  a  very  ancient  connection  that  they  were 
not  then  peopled  with  beasts  of  prey,  while 
subsequently  their  distance  from  other  coun- 
tries has  prevented  them  from  receiving  such 

*  Note  that  in  Tasmania,  which  is  very  near  Australia,  both 
in  space  and  in  the  character  of  its  animals,  there  are  two  car- 
nivorous mammals,  the  Tasmanian  "  Wolf"  and  the  Tasma- 
nian  Devil,  and  no  Jlightless  birds. 


156  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

population  by  accident  in  recent  times  and  has 
also  retarded  the  arrival  of  man. 

Once  established,  flightlessness  and  size  play 
into  one  another's  hands;  the  flightless  bird 
has  no  limit  placed  on  its  size  *  while  granted 
a  food  supply  and  immunity  from  man ;  the 
larger  the  bird  the  less  the  necessity  for  wings 
to  escape  from  four-footed  foes.  So  long  as 
the  climate  was  favorable  and  man  absent,  the 
big,  clumsy  bird  might  thrive,  but  upon  the 
coming  of  man,  or  in  the  face  of  any  unfavor- 
able change  of  climate,  he  would  be  at  a  se- 
rious disadvantage  and  hence  whenever  either 
of  these  two  factors  has  been  brought  to  bear 
against  them  the  feathered  giants  have  van- 
ished. 

REFERENCES 

'  There  is  a  Jine  collection  of  mounted  skeletons  of  va- 
rious species  of  Mpas  in  the  Museum  of  Comparative 
Zoology  at  Cambridge,  Mass.,  and  another  in  the  Amer- 
ican Museum  of  Natural  History,  New  York.  A  few 

*  While  we  do  not  know  the  limit  of  size  to  a  flying  creature, 
none  has  as  yet  been  found  whose  wings  would  spread  over 
twenty  feet  from  tip  to  tip,  and  it  is  evident  that  wings  larger 
than  this  would  demand  great  strength  for  their  manipulation. 


FEATHERED   GIANTS  157 

other  skeletons  and  numerous  bones  are  to  be  found  in 
other  institutions,  but  the  author  is  not  aware  of  any  egg 
being  in  this  country.  Specimens  of  the  SEpyornis  are 
rare  in  this  country,  but  Mr.  Robert  Gufort,  of  Orange, 
N. J.,  is  the  possessor  of  a  very  fine  egg.  A  number  of 
eggs  have  been  sold  in  London,  the  prices  ranging  from 
£200  down  to  £42,  this  last  being  much  less  than  prices 
paid  for  eggs  of  the  great  auk.  But  then,  the  great 
auk  is  somewhat  of  a  fad,  and  there  are  just  enough 
eggs  in  existence  to  bring  one  into  the  market  every 
little  while.  Besides,  the  number  of  eggs  of  the  great 
auk  is  a  fixed  quantity,  while  no  one  knows  how  many 
more  of  JEpyornis  remain  to  be  discovered  in  the  swamps 
of  Madagascar.  No  specimens  of  the  gigantic  Pata- 
gonian  birds  are  now  in  this  country,  but  a  fine  exam- 
ple of  one  of  the  smaller  forms,  Pelycomis,  including 
the  only  breast-bone  yet  found,  is  in  the  Museum  of 
Princeton  University. 

The  largest  known  tibia  of  a  Moa,  the  longest  bird- 
bone  known,  is  in  the  collection  of  the  Canterbury  Mu- 
seum, Christchurch,  New  Zealand ;  it  is  3  feet  3  inches 
long.  This,  however,  is  exceptional,  the  measurements 
of  the  leg-bones  of  an  ordinary  Dinornis  maximus 
being  as  follows :  Femur,  18  inches ;  tibia,  32  inches ; 
tarsus,  19  inches,  a  total  of  5  feet  9  inches.  The  egg 
measures  10\  by  6^  inches. 

There  is  plenty  of  literature,  and  very   interesting 


158  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

literature,  about  the  Moos,  but,  unfortunately,  the  best 
of  it  is  not  always  accessible,  being  contained  in  the 
"  Nezo  Zealand  Journal  of  Science  "  and  the  "  Transac- 
tions of  the  New  Zealand  Institute.'1''  The  volume  of 
"  Transactions'"  for  1893,  being  vol.  xxvi.,  contains  a 
very  full  list  of  articles  relating  to  the  Moos,  compiled 
by  Mr.  A.  Hamilton ;  it  will  be  found  to  commence  on 
page  229.  There  is  a  good  article  on  Moa  in  Newton's 
"  Dictionary  of  Birds,"  a  book  that  should  be  in  every 
library. 


Fig.  32.  —  The  Three  Giants,  Phororhacos,  Moa,  Ostrich. 


IX 

THE   ANCESTRY   OF  THE   HORSE 

"  Said  the  little  Eohippus 

I  am  going  to  be  a  horse 
And  on  my  middle  Jinger-nails 
To  run  my  earthly  course." 

The  American  whose  ancestors  came  over  in 
the  "  Mayflower "  has  a  proper  pride  in  the 
length  of  the  line  of  his  descent.  The  English- 
man whose  genealogical  tree  sprang  up  at  the 
time  of  William  the  Conqueror  has,  in  its  eight 
centuries  of  growth,  still  larger  occasion  for 
pluming  himself  on  the  antiquity  of  his  family. 
But  the  pedigree  of  even  the  latter  is  a  thing 
of  yesterday  when  compared  with  that  of  the 
horse,  whose  family  records,  according  to  Pro- 
fessor Osborn,  reach  backward  for  something 
like  2,000,000  years.  And  if,  as  we  have  been 
told,  "  it  is  a  good  thing  to  have  ancestors,  but 
sometimes  a  little  hard  on  the  ancestor,"  in  this 

159 


160  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

instance  at  least  the  founders  of  the  family 
have  every  reason  to  regard  their  descendants 
with  undisguised  pride.  For  the  horse  family 
started  in  life  in  a  small  way,  and  the  first  of 
the  line,  the  Hyracotherium,  was  "  a  little  an- 
imal no  bigger  than  a  fox,  and  on  five  *  toes 
he  scampered  over  Tertiary  rocks,"  in  the  age 
called  Eocene,  because  it  was  the  morning  of 
life  for  the  great  group  of  mammals  whose  cul- 
minating point  was  man.  At  that  time,  west- 
ern North  America  was  a  country  of  many 
lakes,  for  the  most  part  comparatively  shallow, 
around  the  reedy  margins  of  which  moved  a 
host  of  animals,  quite  unlike  those  of  to-day, 
and  yet  foreshadowing  them,  the  forerunners 
of  the  rhinoceros,  tapir,  and  the  horse. 

The  early  horse  —  we  may  call  him  so  by 
courtesy,  although  he  was  then  very  far  from 
being  a  true  horse  —  was  an  insignificant  little 
creature,  apparently  far  less  likely  to  succeed 
in  life's  race  than  his  bulky  competitors,  and 
yet,  by  making  the  most  of  their  opportunities, 

*  Four,  to  be  exact ;  but  we  prefer  to  sacrifice  the  foot  of 
the  Hyracothere  rather  than  to  take  liberties  with  one  of  the 
feet  of  Mrs.  Stetson's  poem. 


THE   ANCESTRY   OF  THE   HORSE        161 

his  descendants  have  survived,  while  most  of 
theirs  have  dropped  by  the  wayside ;  and 
finally,  by  the  aid  of  man,  the  horse  has  be- 


Fig.  33.  — Skeleton  of  the   Modern   Horse  and  of  His 
Eocene  Ancestor. 

come  spread  over  the  length  and  breadth  of 
the  habitable  globe. 

Now  right  here  it  may  be  asked,  How  do 
we  know  that  the  little  Hyracothere  was  the 


162  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

progenitor  of  the  horse,  and  how  can  it  be 
shown  that  there  is  any  bond  of  kinship  be- 
tween him  and,  for  example,  the  great  French 
Percheron  ?  There  is  only  one  way  in  which 
we  can  obtain  this  knowledge,  and  but  one 
method  by  which  the  relationship  can  be 
shown,  and  that  is  by  collecting  the  fossil  re- 
mains of  animals  long  extinct  and  comparing 
them  with  the  bones  of  the  recent  horse,  a 
branch  of  science  known  as  Palaeontology.  It 
has  taken  a  very  long  time  to  gather  the  nec- 
essary evidence,  and  it  has  taken  a  vast  amount 
of  hard  work  in  our  western  Territories,  for 
"  the  country  that  is  as  hot  as  Hades,  watered 
by  stagnant  alkali  pools,  is  almost  invariably 
the  richest  in  fossils."  Likewise  it  has  called 
for  the  expenditure  of  much  time  and  more  pa- 
tience to  put  together  some  of  this  petrified 
evidence,  fragmentary  in  every  sense  of  the 
word,  and  get  it  into  such  shape  that  it  could 
be  handled  by  the  anatomist.  Still,  the  work 
has  been  done,  and,  link  by  link,  the  chain  has 
been  constructed  that  unites  the  horse  of  to-day 
with  the  horse  of  very  many  yesterdays. 

The  very  first  links  in  this  chain  are  the  re- 


THE   ANCESTRY    OF   THE    HORSE         163 

mains  of  the  bronze  age  and  those  found  among 
the  ruins  of  the  ancient  Swiss  lake  dwell- 
ings ;  but  earlier  still  than  these  are  the  bones 
of  horses  found  abundantly  in  northern  Europe, 
Asia,  and  America.  The  individual  bones  and 
teeth  of  some  of  these  horses  are  scarcely  dis- 
tinguishable from  those  of  to-day,  a  fact  noted 
in  the  name,  Equus  fraternus,  applied  to  one 
species  ;  and  when  teeth  alone  are  found,  it  is 
at  times  practically  impossible  to  say  whether 
they  belong  to  a  fossil  horse  or  to  a  modern 
animal.  But  when  enough  scattered  bones  are 
gathered  to  make  a  fairly  complete  skeleton,  it 
becomes  evident  that  the  fossil  horse  had  a  pro- 
portionately larger  head  and  smaller  feet  than 
his  existing  relative,  and  that  he  was  a  little 
more  like  an  ass  or  zebra,  for  the  latter,  spite 
of  his  gay  coat,  is  a  near  relative  of  the  lowly 
ass.  Moreover,  primitive  man  made  sketches 
of  the  primitive  horse,  just  as  he  did  of  the 
mammoth,  and  these  indicate  that  the  horse  of 
those  days  was  something  like  an  overgrown 
Shetland  pony,  low  and  heavily  built,  large- 
headed  and  rough-coated.  For  the  old  cave- 
dwellers  of  Europe  were  intimately  acquainted 


164  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

with  the  prehistoric  horses,  using  them  for 
food,  as  they  did  almost  every  animal  that  fell 
beneath  their  flint  arrows  and  stone  axes.  And 
if  one  may  judge  from  the  abundance  of  bones, 
the  horses  must  have  roamed  about  in  bands, 
just  as  the  horses  escaped  from  civilization 
roam,  or  have  roamed,  over  the  pampas  of 
South  America  and  the  prairies  of  the  West. 

The  horse  was  just  as  abundant  in  North 
America  in  Pleistocene  time  as  in  Europe ; 
but  there  is  no  evidence  to  show  that  it  was 
contemporary  with  early  man  in  North  Amer- 
ica, and,  even  were  this  the  case,  it  is  generally 
believed  that  long  before  the  discovery  of 
America  the  horse  had  disappeared.  And  yet, 
so  plentiful  and  so  fresh  are  his  remains,  and 
so  much  like  those  of  the  mustang,  that  the 
late  Professor  Cope  was  wont  to  say  that  it 
almost  seemed  as  if  the  horse  might  have 
lingered  in  Texas  until  the  coming  of  the  white 
man.  And  Sir  William  Flower  wrote  :  "  There 
is  a  possibility  of  the  animal  having  still  ex- 
isted, in  a  wild  state,  in  some  parts  of  the  con- 
tinent remote  from  that  which  was  first  visited 
by  the  Spaniards,  where  they  were  certainly 


THE   ANCESTRY   OF  THE   HORSE         165 

unknown.  It  has  been  suggested  that  the 
horses  which  were  found  by  Cabot  in  La  Plata 
in  1530  cannot  have  been  introduced." 

Still  we  have  not  the  least  little  bit  of  posi- 
tive proof  that  such  was  the  case,  and  although 
the  site  of  many  an  ancient  Indian  village  has 
been  carefully  explored,  no  bones  of  the  horse 
have  come  to  light,  or  if  they  have  been  found, 
bones  of  the  ox  or  sheep  were  also  present  to 
tell  that  the  village  was  occupied  long  after 
the  advent  of  the  whites.  It  is  also  a  curious 
fact  that  within  historic  times  there  have  been 
no  wild  horses,  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word, 
unless  indeed  those  found  on  the  steppes  north 
of  the  Sea  of  Azof  be  wild,  and  this  is  very 
doubtful.  But  long  before  the  dawn  of  history 
the  horse  was  domesticated  in  Europe,  and 
Caesar  found  the  Germans,  and  even  the  old 
Britons,  using  war  chariots  drawn  by  horses  — 
for  the  first  use  man  seems  to  have  made  of 
the  horse  was  to  aid  him  in  killing  off  his  fel- 
low-man, and  not  until  comparatively  modern 
times  was  the  animal  employed  in  the  peace- 
ful arts  of  agriculture.  The  immediate  prede- 
cessors of  these  horses  were  considerably 


166  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

smaller,  being  about  the  size  and  build  of  a 
pony,  but  they  were  very  much  like  a  horse  in 
structure,  save  that  the  teeth  were  shorter. 
As  they  lived  during  Pliocene  times,  they  have 
been  named  "  Pliohippus." 

Going  back  into  the  past  a  step  farther, 
though  a  pretty  long  step  if  we  reckon  by 
years,  we  come  upon  a  number  of  animals  very 
much  like  horses,  save  for  certain  cranial  pe- 
culiarities and  the  fact  that  they  had  three 
toes  on  each  foot,  while  the  horse,  as  every  one 
knows,  has  but  one  toe.  Now,  if  we  glance  at 
the  skeleton  of  a  horse,  we  will  see  on  either 
side  of  the  canon-bone,  in  the  same  situation 
as  the  upper  part  of  the  little  toes  of  the  Hip- 
potherium,  as  these  three- toed  horses  are  called, 
a  long  slender  bone,  termed  by  veterinarians 
the  splint  bone ;  and  it  requires  no  anatomical 
training  to  see  that  the  bones  in  the  two  ani- 
mals are  the  same.  The  horse  lacks  the  lower 
part  of  his  side  toes,  that  is  all,  just  as  man 
will  very  probably  some  day  lack  the  last  bones 
of  his  little  toe.  We  find  an  approach  to  this 
condition  in  some  of  the  Hippotheres  even, 
known  as  Protohippus,  in  which  the  side  toes 


THE   ANCESTRY   OF   THE   HORSE         167 

are  quite  small,  foreshadowing  the  time  when 
they  shall  have  disappeared  entirely.  It  may 
also  be  noted  here  that  the  splint  bones  of  the 
horses  of  the  bronze  age  are  a  little  longer  than 
those  of  existing  horses,  and  that  they  are 
never  united  with  the  large  central  toe,  while 
nowadays  there  is  something  of  a  tendency  for 
the  three  bones  to  fuse  into  one,  although  part 
of  this  tendency  the  writer  believes  to  be  due 
to  inflammation  set  up  by  the  strain  of  the 
pulling  and  hauling  the  animal  is  now  called 
upon  to  do.  Some  of  these  three- toed  Hippo- 
theres  are  not  in  the  direct  line  ol  ancestry  of 
the  horse,  but  are  side  branches  on  the  family 
tree,  having  become  so  highly  specialized  in 
certain  directions  that  no  further  progress 
horseward  was  possible. 

Backward  still,  and  the  bones  we  find  in  the 
Miocene  strata  of  the  West,  belonging  to  those 
ancestors  of  the  horse  to  which  the  name  of 
Mesohippus  has  been  given  because  they  are 
midway  in  time  and  structure  between  the 
horse  of  the  past  and  present,  tell  us  that 
then  all  horses  were  small  and  that  all  had 
three  toes  on  a  foot,  while  the  fore  feet  bore 


168 


ANIMALS   OF  THE    PAST 


even  the  suggestion  of  a  fourth  toe.  From 
this  to  our  Eocene  Hyracothere  with  four  toes 
is  only  another  long-time  step.  We  may  go 
even  beyond  this  in  time  and  structure,  and 
carry  back  the  line  of  the  horse  to  animals 


I    li      II       1 


PBOTOROHIPPUS  HESOHIPPUS  MESOHIPPUS 

VEKTICOLUS.  COPE         BA1RMI.  LEIW  PRAESTANS.  COPE 


Fig.  34.  —  The  Development 

which  only  remotely  resembled  him  and  had 
five  good  toes  to  a  foot ;  but  while  these  con- 
tained the  possibility  of  a  horse,  they  made  no 
show  of  it. 

Increase  in  size  and  decrease  in  number  of 


THE   ANCESTRY   OF  THE    HORSE         169 

the  toes  were  not  the  only  changes  that  were 
required  to  transform  the  progeny  of  the  Hy- 
racothere  into  a  horse.  These  are  the  most 
evident ;  but  the  increased  complexity  in  the 
structure  of  the  teeth  was  quite  as  important. 


of  the  Horse. 

The  teeth  of  gnawing  animals  have  often  been 
compared  to  a  chisel  which  is  made  of  a  steel 
plate  with  soft  iron  backing,  and  the  teeth  of 
a  horse,  or  of  other  grass-eating  animals,  are 
simply  an  elaboration  of  this  idea.  The  hard 


170  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

enamel,  which  represents  the  steel,  is  set  in 
soft  dentine,  which  represents  the  iron,  and  in 
use  the  dentine  wears  away  the  faster  of  the 
two,  so  that  the  enamel  stands  up  in  ridges, 
each  tooth  becoming,  as  it  is  correctly  termed, 
"  a  grinder."  In  a  horse  the  plates  of  enamel 
form  curved,  complex,  irregular  patterns  ;  but 
as  we  go  back  in  time,  the  patterns  become 
less  and  less  elaborate,  until  in  the  Hyraco- 
there,  standing  at  the  foot  of  the  family  tree, 
the  teeth  are  very  simple  in  structure.  More- 
over, his  teeth  were  of  limited  growth,  while 
those  of  the  horse  grow  for  a  considerable 
time,  thus  compensating  for  the  wear  to  which 
they  are  subjected. 

We  have,  then,  this  direct  evidence  as  to 
the  genealogy  of  the  horse,  that  between  the 
little  Eocene  Hyracothere  and  the  modern 
horse  we  can  place  a  series  of  animals  by 
which  we  can  pass  by  gradual  stages  from  one 
to  the  other,  and  that  as  we  come  upward 
there  is  an  increase  in  stature,  in  the  com- 
plexity of  the  teeth,  and  in  the  size  of  the 
brain.  At  the  same  time,  the  number  of  toes 
decreases,  which  tells  that  the  animals  were 


THE    ANCESTRY    OF   THE    HORSE         171 

developing  more  and  more  speed ;  for  it  is  a 
rule  that  the  fewer  the  toes  the  faster  the  ani- 
mal :  the  fastest  of  birds,  the  ostrich,  has  but 
two  toes,  and  one  of  these  is  mostly  ornamen- 
tal ;  and  the  fastest  of  mammals,  the  horse, 
has  but  one. 

All  breeders  of  fancy  stock,  particularly  of 
pigeons  and  poultry,  recognize  the  tendency 
of  animals  to  revert  to  the  forms  whence  they 
were  derived  and  reproduce  some  character  of 
a  distant  ancestor ;  to  "  throw  back,"  as  the 
breeders  term  it.  If  now,  instead  of  repro- 
ducing a  trait  or  feature  possessed  by  some 
ancestor  a  score,  a  hundred,  or  perhaps  a  thou- 
sand years  ago,  there  should  reappear  a  char- 
acteristic of  some  ancestor  that  flourished 
100,000  years  back,  we  should  have  a  seeming 
abnormality,  but  really  a  case  of  reversion ; 
and  the  more  we  become  acquainted  with  the 
structure  of  extinct  animals  and  the  develop- 
ment of  those  now  living,  the  better  able  are 
we  to  explain  these  apparent  abnormalities. 

Bearing  in  mind  that  the  two  splint  bones 
of  the  horse  correspond  to  the  upper  portions 
of  the  side  toes  of  the  Hippotherium  and 


172  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

Mesohippus,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  if  for  any 
reason  these  should  develop  into  toes,  they 
would  make  the  foot  of  a  modern  horse  appear 
like  that  of  his  distant  ancestor.  While  such 
a  thing  rarely  happens,  yet  now  and  then  nat- 
ure apparently  does  attempt  to  reproduce  a 
horse's  foot  after  the  ancient  pattern,  for  occa- 
sionally we  meet  with  a  horse  having,  instead 
of  the  single  toe  with  which  the  average  horse 
is  satisfied,  one  or  possibly  two  extra  toes. 
Sometimes  the  toe  is  extra  in  every  sense  of 
the  word,  being  a  mere  duplication  of  the  cen- 
tral toe ;  but  sometimes  it  is  an  actual  devel- 
opment of  one  of  the  splint  bones.  No  less  a 
personage  than  Julius  Csesar  possessed  one  of 
these  polydactyl  horses,  and  the  reporters  of 
the  Daily  Roman  and  the  Tiberian  Gazette 
doubtless  wrote  it  up  in  good  journalistic 
Latin,  for  we  find  the  horse  described  as  hav- 
ing feet  that  were  almost  human,  and  as  being 
looked  upon  with  great  awe.  While  this  is 
the  most  celebrated  of  extra- toed  horses,  other 
and  more  plebeian  individuals  have  been  much 
more  widely  known  through  having  been  ex- 
hibited throughout  the  country  under  such 


THE   ANCESTRY    OF  THE   HORSE         173 

titles  as  "  Clique,  the  horse  with  six  feet," 
"  the  eight-footed  Cuban  horse,"  and  so  on  ; 
and  possibly  some  of  these  are  familiar  to 
readers  of  this  page. 

So  the  collateral  evidence,  though  scanty, 
bears  out  the  circumstantial  proof,  derived 
from  fossil  bones,  that  the  horse  has  developed 
from  a  many-toed  ancestor ;  and  the  evidence 
points  toward  the  little  Hyracothere  as  being 
that  ancestor.  It  remains  only  to  show  some 
good  reason  why  this  development  should 
have  taken  place,  or  to  indicate  the  forces  by 
which  it  was  brought  about.  We  have  heard 
much  about  "the  survival  of  the  fittest,"  a 
phrase  which  simply  means  that  those  animals 
best  adapted  to  their  surroundings  will  sur- 
vive, while  those  ill  adapted  will  perish.  But 
it  should  be  added  that  it  means  also  that  the 
animals  must  be  able  to  adapt  themselves  to 
changes  in  their  environment,  or  to  change 
with  it.  Living  beings  cannot  stand  still  in- 
definitely; they  must  progress  or  perish.  And 
this  seems  to  have  been  the  cause  for  the  ex- 
tinction of  the  huge  quadrupeds  that  flour- 
ished at  the  time  of  the  three-toed  Miocene 


174  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

horse.  They  were  adapted  to  their  environ- 
ment as  it  was  ;  but  when  the  western  moun- 
tains were  thrust  upward,  cutting  off  the 
moist  winds  from  the  Pacific,  making  great 
changes  in  the  rainfall  and  climate  to  the  east- 
ward of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  these  big 
beasts,  slow  of  foot  and  dull  of  brain,  could 
not  keep  pace  with  the  change,  and  their  race 
vanished  from  the  face  of  the  earth.  The  day 
of  the  little  Hyracothere  was  at  the  beginning 
of  the  great  series  of  changes  by  which  the 
lake  country  of  the  West,  with  its  marshy 
flats  and  rank  vegetation,  became  transformed 
into  dry  uplands  sparsely  clad  with  fine 
grasses.  On  these  dry  plains  the  more  nimble- 
footed  animals  would  have  the  advantage  in 
the  struggle  for  existence  ;  and  while  the  four- 
toed  foot  would  keep  its  owner  from  sinking 
in  soft  ground,  he  was  handicapped  when  it 
became  a  question  of  speed,  for  not  only  is  a 
fleet  animal  better  able  to  flee  from  danger 
than  his  slower  fellows,  but  in  time  of  drouth 
he  can  cover  the  greater  extent  of  territory 
in  search  of  food  or  water.  So,  too,  as  the 
rank  rushes  gave  place  to  fine  grasses,  often 


THE   ANCESTRY   OF  THE   HORSE         175 

browned  and  withered  beneath  the  summer's 
sun,  the  complex  tooth  had  an  advantage  over 
that  of  simpler  structure,  while  the  cutting- 
teeth,  so  completely  developed  in  the  horse 
family,  enabled  their  possessors  to  crop  the 
grass  as  closely  as  one  could  do  it  with  scis- 
sors. Likewise,  up  to  a  certain  point,  the 
largest,  most  powerful  animal  will  not  only 
conquer,  or  escape  from,  his  enemies,  but  pre- 
vail over  rivals  of  his  own  kind  as  well,  and 
thus  it  came  to  pass  that  those  early  members 
of  the  horse  family  who  were  preeminent  in 
speed  and  stature,  and  harmonized  best  with 
their  surroundings,  outstripped  their  fellows 
and  transmitted  these  qualities  to  their  prog- 
eny, until,  as  a  result  of  long  ages  of  natural 
selection,  there  was  developed  the  modern 
horse.  The  rest  man  has  done :  the  heavy, 
slow-paced  dray  horse,  the  fleet  trotter,  the 
huge  Percheron,  and  the  diminutive  pony  are 
one  and  all  the  recent  products  of  artificial 
selection. 


176  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

REFERENCES. 

The  best  collection  of  fossil  horses,  and  one  specially 
arranged  to  illustrate  the  line  of  descent  of  the  modern 
horse,  is  to  be  found  in  the  American  Museum  of  Natu- 
ral History,  New  York,  but  some  good  specimens,  of  par- 
ticular interest  because  they  were  described  by  Professor 
Marsh  and  studied  by  Huxley  are  in  the  Yale  University 
Museum.  They  are  referred  to  in  Huxley's  "  Amer- 
ican Addresses ;  Lectures  on  Evolution "  "  The 
Horse,''''  by  Sir  W.  H.  Flower,  discusses  the  horse  in  a 
popular  manner  from  various  points  of  view  and  contains 
numerous  references  to  books  and  articles  on  the  subject 
from  which  anyone  wishing  for  further  information  could 
obtain  it. 


X 

THE   MAMMOTH 

"  His  legs  were  as  thick  as  the  bole  of  the  beech, 

His  tusks  as  the  buttonwood  white, 
While  his  lithe  trunk  wound  like  a  sapling  around 
An  oak  in  the  whirlmnd's  might." 

In  the  October  number  of  McClures  Magazine  for  1899 
was  published  a  short  story,  "  The  Killing  of  the  Mammoth," 
by  "  H.  Tukeman,"  which,  to  the  amazement  of  the  editors,  was 
taken  by  many  readers  not  as  Jiction,  but  as  a  contribution  to 
natural  history.  Immediately  after  the  appearance  of  that 
number  of  the  magazine,  the  authorities  of  the  Smithsonian  In- 
stitution, in  which  the  author  had  located  the  remains  of  the 
beast  of  his  fancy,  were  beset  with  visitors  to  see  the  stuffed 
mammoth,  and  the  daily  mail  of  the  Magazine,  as  well  as  that 
of  the  Smithsonian  Institution,  was  Jilled  with  inquiries  for 
more  information  and  for  requests  to  settle  wagers  as  to  whether 
it  was  a  true  story  or  not.  The  contribution  in  question  was 
printed  purely  as  Jiction,  with  no  idea  of  misleading  the  public, 
and  was  entitled  a  story  in  the  table  of  contents.  We  doubt  if 
any  writer  of  realistic  Jiction  ever  had  a  more  general  and  con- 
vincing proof  of  success. 

ABOUT  three  centuries  ago,  in  1696,  a  Russian, 
one  Ludloff  by  name,  described  some  bones 

177 


178  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

belonging  to  what  the  Tartars  called  "  Mam- 
antu  "  ;  later  on,  Blumenbach  pressed  the  com- 
mon name  into  scientific  use  as  "  Mammut," 
and  Cuvier  gallicized  this  into  "  Mammouth," 
whence  by  an  easy  transition  we  get  our  fam- 
iliar mammoth.  We  are  so  accustomed  to 
use  the  word  to  describe  anything  of  remark- 
able size  that  it  would  be  only  natural  to  sup- 
pose that  the  name  Mammoth  was  given  to 
the  extinct  elephant  because  of  its  extraordi- 
nary bulk.  Exactly  the  reverse  of  this  is  true, 
however,  for  the  word  came  to  have  its  present 
meaning  because  the  original  possessor  of  the 
name  was  a  huge  animal.  The  Siberian  peas- 
ants called  the  creature  "  Mamantu,"  or 
"  ground-dweller,"  because  they  believed  it  to 
be  a  gigantic  mole,  passing  its  life  beneath  the 
ground  and  perishing  when  by  any  accident  it 
saw  the  light.  The  reasoning  that  led  to  this 
belief  was  very  simple  and  the  logic  very  good ; 
no  one  had  ever  seen  a  live  Mamantu,  but 
there  were  plenty  of  its  bones  lying  at  or  near 
the  surface ;  consequently  if  the  animal  did  not 
live  above  the  ground,  it  must  dwell  below. 
To-day,  nearly  every  one  knows  that  the 


THE   MAMMOTH  179 

mammoth  was  a  sort  of  big,  hairy  elephant, 
now  extinct,  and  nearly  every  one  has  a  gen- 
eral idea  that  it  lived  in  the  North.  There  is 
some  uncertainty  as  to  whether  the  mammoth 
was  a  mastodon,  or  the  mastodon  a  mammoth, 
and  there  is  a  great  deal  of  misconception  as 
to  the  size  and  abundance  of  this  big  beast.  It 
may  be  said  in  passing  that  the  mastodon  is 
only  a  second  or  third  cousin  of  the  mammoth, 
but  that  the  existing  elephant  of  Asia  is  a  very 
near  relative,  certainly  as  near  as  a  first  cousin, 
possibly  a  very  great  grandson.  Popularly,  the 
mammoth  is  supposed  to  have  been  a  colossus 
somewhere  from  twelve  to  twenty  feet  in 
height,  beside  whom  modern  elephants  would 
seem  insignificant;  but  as  "trout  lose  much  in 
dressing,"  so  mammoths  shrink  in  measuring, 
and  while  there  were  doubtless  Jumbos  among 
them  in  the  way  of  individuals  of  exceptional 
magnitude,  the  majority  were  decidedly  under 
Jumbo's  size.  The  only  mounted  mammoth 
skeleton  in  this  country,  that  in  the  Chicago 
Academy  of  Sciences,  is  one  of  the  largest,  the 
thigh-bone  measuring  five  feet  one  inch  in 
length,  or  a  foot  more  than  that  of  Jumbo; 


180       •          AN7IMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

and  as  Jumbo  stood  eleven  feet  high,  the  rule 
of  three  applied  to  this  thigh-bone  would  give 
the  living  animal  a  height  of  thirteen  feet 
eight  inches.  The  height  of  this  specimen  is 
given  as  thirteen  feet  in  its  bones,  with  an  es- 
timate of  fourteen  feet  in  its  clothes ;  but  as  the 
skeleton  is  obviously  mounted  altogether  too 
high,  it  is  pretty  safe  to  say  that  thirteen  feet 
is  a  good,  fair  allowance  for  the  height  of  this 
animal  when  alive.  As  for  the  majority  of 
mammoths,  they  would  not  average  more  than 
nine  or  ten  feet  high.  Sir  Samuel  Baker  tells 
us  that  he  has  seen  plenty  of  wild  African  ele- 
phants that  would  exceed  Jumbo  by  a  foot  or 
more,  and  while  this  must  be  accepted  with 
caution,  since  unfortunately  he  neglected  to 
put  a  tape-line  on  them,  yet  Mr.  Thomas 
Baines  did  measure  a  specimen  twelve  feet 
high.  This,  coupled  with  Sir  Samuel's  state- 
ment, indicates  that  there  is  not  so  much  dif- 
ference between  the  mammoth  and  the  ele- 
phant as  there  might  be.  This  applies  to  the 
mammoth  par  excellence,  the  species  known 
scientifically  as  Elephas  primigenius,  whose 
remains  are  found  in  many  parts  of  the  North- 


THE   MAMMOTH  181 

ern  Hemisphere  and  occur  abundantly  in  Si- 
beria and  Alaska.  There  were  other  elephants 
than  the  mammoth,  and  some  that  exceeded 
him  in  size,  notably  Elephas  meridionalis  of 
southern  Europe,  and  Elephas  columbi  of  our 
Southern  and  Western  States,  but  even  the 
largest  cannot  positively  be  asserted  to  have 
exceeded  a  height  of  thirteen  feet.  Tusks 
offer  convenient  terms  of  comparison,  and 
those  of  an  average  fully  grown  mammoth 
are  from  eight  to  ten  feet  in  length ;  those  of 
the  famous  St.  Petersburg  specimen  and  those 
of  the  huge  specimen  in  Chicago  measuring 
respectively  nine  feet  three  inches,  and  nine 
feet  eight  inches.  So  far  as  the  writer  is 
aware,  the  largest  tusks  actually  measured  are 
two  from  Alaska,  one  twelve  feet  ten  inches 
long,  weighing  190  pounds,  reported  by  Mr. 
Jay  Beach;  and  another  eleven  feet  long, 
weighing  200  pounds,  noted  by  Mr.  T.  L. 
Brevig.  Compared  with  these  we  have  the 
big  tusk  that  used  to  stand  on  Fulton  Street, 
New  York,  just  an  inch  under  nine  feet  long, 
and  weighing  184  pounds,  or  the  largest  shown 
at  Chicago  in  1893,  which  was  seven  feet  six 


182  ANIMALS    OF   THE    PAST 

inches  long,  and  weighed  176  pounds.  The 
largest,  most  beautiful  tusks,  probably,  ever 
seen  in  this  country  were  a  pair  brought  from 
Zanzibar  and  displayed  by  Messrs.  Tiffany  & 
Company  in  1900.  The  measurements  and 
weights  of  these  were  as  follows  :  length  along 
outer  curve,  ten  feet  and  three-fourths  of  an 
inch,  circumference  one  foot,  eleven  inches, 
weight,  224  pounds ;  length  along  outer  curve, 
ten  feet,  three  and  one-half  inches,  circumfer- 
ence two  feet  and  one-fourth  of  an  inch,  weight, 
239  pounds. 

For  our  knowledge  of  the  external  appear- 
ance of  the  mammoth  we  are  indebted  to  the 
more  or  less  entire  examples  which  have  been 
found  at  various  times  in  Siberia,  but  mainly 
to  the  noted  specimen  found  in  1799  near  the 
Lena,  embedded  in  the  ice,  where  it  had  been 
reposing,  so  geologists  tell  us,  anywhere  from 
10,000  to  50,000  years.  How  the  creature 
gradually  thawed  out  of  its  icy  tomb,  and  the 
tusks  were  taken  by  the  discoverer  and  sold 
for  ivory  ;  how  the  dogs  fed  upon  the  flesh  in 
summer,  while  bears  and  wolves  feasted  upon 
it  in  winter;  how  the  animal  was  within  an 


THE    MAMMOTH  183 

ace  of  being  utterly  lost  to  science  when,  at 
the  last  moment,  the  mutilated  remains  were 
rescued  by  Mr.  Adams,  is  an  old  story,  often 


Fig.    36.  —  Skeleton    of    the    Mammoth    in    the    Royal 
Museum  of  St.  Petersburg. 


told  and  retold.  Suffice  it  to  say  that,  besides 
the  bones,  enough  of  the  beast  was  preserved 
to  tell  us  exactly  what  was  the  covering  of  this 


184  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

ancient  elephant,  and  to  show  that  it  was  a 
creature  adapted  to  withstand  the  northern 
cold  and  fitted  for  living  on  the  branches  of 
the  birch  and  hemlock. 

The  exact  birthplace  of  the  mammoth  is  as 
uncertain  as  that  of  many  other  great  charac- 
ters ;  but  his  earliest  known  resting-place  is  in 
the  Cromer  Forest  Beds  of  England,  a  country 
inhabited  by  him  at  a  time  when  the  German 
Ocean  was  dry  land  and  Great  Britain  part  of 
a  peninsula.  Here  his  remains  are  found  to- 
day, while  from  the  depths  of  the  North  Sea 
the  hardy  trawlers  have  dredged  hundreds,  aye 
thousands,  of  mammoth  teeth  in  company  with 
soles  and  turbot.  If,  then,  the  mammoth  orig- 
ated  in  western  Europe,  and  not  in  that  great 
graveyard  of  fossil  elephants,  northern  India, 
eastward  he  went  spreading  over  all  Europe 
north  of  the  Pyrenees  and  Alps,  save  only 
Scandinavia,  whose  glaciers  offered  no  attrac- 
tions, scattering  his  bones  abundantly  by  the 
wayside  to  serve  as  marvels  for  future  ages. 
Strange  indeed  have  been  some  of  the  tales  to 
which  these  and  other  elephantine  remains 
have  given  rise  when  they  came  to  light  in  the 


THE   MAMMOTH  185 

good  old  days  when  knowledge  of  anatomy 
was  small  and  credulity  was  great.  The  least 
absurd  theory  concerning  them  was  that  they 
were  the  bones  of  the  elephants  which  Hanni- 
bal brought  from  Africa.  Occasionally  they 
were  brought  forward  as  irrefutable  evidences 
of  the  deluge  ;  but  usually  they  figured  as  the 
bones  of  giants,  the  most  famous  of  them  being 
known  as  Teutobochus,  King  of  the  Cimbri,  a 
lusty  warrior  said  to  have  had  a  height  of  nine- 
teen feet.  Somewhat  smaller,  but  still  of  re- 
spectable height,  fourteen  feet,  was  "Littell 
Johne"  of  Scotland,  whereof  Hector  Boece 
wrote,  concluding,  in  a  moralizing  tone,  "  Be 
quilk  (which)  it  appears  how  extravegant  and 
squaire  pepill  grew  in  oure  regioun  afore  they 
were  effeminat  with  lust  and  intemperance  of 
mouth."  More  than  this,  these  bones  have 
been  venerated  in  Greece  and  Rome  as  the  re- 
mains of  pagan  heroes,  and  later  on  worshipped 
as  relics  of  Christian  saints.  Did  not  the 
church  of  Valencia  possess  an  elephant  tooth 
which  did  duty  as  that  of  St.  Christopher, 
and,  so  late  as  1789,  was  not  a  thigh-bone,  fig- 
uring as  the  arm-bone  of  a  saint,  carried  in 


186  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

procession    through    the   streets   in   order  to 
bring  rain  ? 

Out  of  Europe  eastward  into  Asia  the  mam- 
moth took  his  way,  and  having  peopled  that 
vast  region,  took  advantage  of  a  land  connec- 
tion then  existing  between  Asia  and  North 
America  and  walked  over  into  Alaska,  in  com- 
pany with  the  forerunners  of  the  bison  and  the 
ancestors  of  the  mountain  sheep  and  Alaskan 
brown  bear.  Still  eastward  and  southward  he 
went,  until  he  came  to  the  Atlantic  coast,  the 
latitude  of  southern  New  York  roughly  mark- 
ing the  southern  boundary  of  the  broad  domain 
over  which  the  mammoth  roamed  undis- 
turbed.* Not  that  of  necessity  all  this  vast  area 
was  occupied  at  one  time ;  but  this  was  the 
range  of  the  mammoth  during  Pleistocene 
time,  for  over  all  this  region  his  bones  and 
teeth  are  found  in  greater  or  less  abundance 
and  in  varying  conditions  of  preservation.  In 
regions  like  parts  of  Siberia  and  Alaska,  where 

*  This  must  be  taken  as  a  very  general  statement,  as  the  dis- 
tinction between  and  habitats  of  Elephas  primigenius  and  Ele- 
phas  columbi,  the  southern  mammoth,  are  not  satisfactorily 
determined  ;  moreover,  the  two  species  overlap  through  a  wide 
area  of  the  West  and  Northwest. 


THE   MAMMOTH  187 

the  bones  are  entombed  in  a  wet  and  cold, 
often  icy,  soil,  the  bones  and  tusks  are  almost 
as  perfectly  preserved  as  though  they  had  been 
deposited  but  a  score  of  years  ago,  while  re- 
mains so  situated  that  they  have  been  sub- 
jected to  varying  conditions  of  dryness  and 
moisture  are  always  in  a  fragmentary  state. 
As  previously  noted,  several  more  or  less  entire 
carcasses  of  the  mammoth  have  been  discov- 
ered in  Siberia,  only  to  be  lost ;  and,  while  no 
entire  animal  has  so  far  been  found  in  Alaska, 
some  day  one  may  yet  come  to  light.  That 
there  is  some  possibility  of  this  is  shown  by  the 
discovery,  recorded  by  Mr.  Dall,  of  the  partial 
skeleton  of  a  mammoth  in  the  bank  of  the 
Yukon  with  some  of  the  fat  still  present,  and 
although  this  had  been  partially  converted  into 
adipocere,  it  was  fresh  enough  to  be  used  by 
the  natives  for  greasing,  not  their  boots,  but 
their  boats.  And  up  to  the  present  time  this 
is  the  nearest  approach  to  finding  a  live  mam- 
moth in  Alaska. 

As  to  why  the  mammoth  became  extinct, 
we  know  absolutely  nothing,  although  various 
theories,  some  much  more  ingenious  than  plaus- 


188  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

ible,  have  been  advanced  to  account  for  their 
extermination  —  they  perished  of  starvation; 
they  were  overtaken  by  floods  on  their  sup- 
posed migrations  and  drowned  in  detachments ; 
they  fell  through  the  ice,  equally  in  detach- 
ments, and  were  swept  out  to  sea.  But  all 
we  can  safely  say  is  that  long  ages  ago 
the  last  one  perished  off  the  face  of  the  earth. 
Strange  it  is,  too,  that  these  mighty  beasts, 
whose  bulk  was  ample  to  protect  them  against 
four-footed  foes,  and  whose  woolly  coat  was 
proof  against  the  cold,  should  have  utterly  van- 
ished. They  ranged  from  England  eastward 
to  New  York,  almost  around  the  world  ;  from 
the  Alps  to  the  Arctic  Ocean ;  and  in  such 
numbers  that  to-day  their  tusks  are  articles  of 
commerce,  and  fossil  ivory  has  its  price  current 
as  well  as  wheat.  Mr.  Boyd  Dawkins  thinks 
that  the  mammoth  was  actually  exterminated 
by  early  man,  but,  even  granting  that  this 
might  be  true  for  southern  and  western  Eu- 
rope, it  could  not  be  true  of  the  herds  that  in- 
habited the  wastes  of  Siberia,  or  of  the  thou- 
sands that  flourished  in  Alaska  and  the  western 
United  States.  So  far  as  man  is  concerned, 


THE   MAMMOTH  189 

the  mammoth  might  still  be  living  in  these  lo- 
calities, where,  before  the  discovery  of  gold 
drew  thousands  of  miners  to  Alaska,  there  were 
vast  stretches  of  wilderness  wholly  untrodden 
by  the  foot  of  man.  Neither  could  this  theory 
account  for  the  disappearance  of  the  mastodon 
from  North  America,  where  that  animal  cov- 
ered so  vast  a  stretch  of  territory  that  man, 
unaided  by  nature,  could  have  made  little  im- 
pression on  its  numbers.  That  many  were 
swept  out  to  sea  by  the  flooded  rivers  of  Si- 
beria is  certain,  for  some  of  the  low  islands  off 
the  coast  are  said  to  be  formed  of  sand,  ice, 
and  bones  of  the  mammoth,  and  thence,  for 
hundreds  of  years,  have  come  the  tusks  which 
are  sold  in  the  market  beside  those  of  the 
African  and  Indian  elephants. 

That  man  was  contemporary  with  the  mam- 
moth in  southern  Europe  is  fairly  certain,  for 
not  only  are  the  remains  of  the  mammoth  and 
man's  flint  weapons  found  together,  but  in  a 
few  instances  some  primeval  Landseer  graved 
on  slate,  ivory,  or  reindeer  antler  a  sketchy 
outline  of  the  beast,  somewhat  impressionistic 
perhaps,  but  still,  like  the  work  of  a  true  artist, 


190  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

preserving  the  salient  features.  We  see  the 
curved  tusks,  the  snaky  trunk,  and  the  shaggy 
coat  that  we  know  belonged  to  the  mammoth, 
and  we  may  feel  assured  that  if  early  man  did 
not  conquer  the  clumsy  creature  with  fire  and 
flint,  he  yet  gazed  upon  him  from  the  safe 
vantage  point  of  some  lofty  tree  or  inaccessi- 
ble rock,  and  then  went  home  to  tell  his  wife 
and  neighbors  how  the  animal  escaped  because 
his  bow  missed  fire.  That  man  and  mammoth 
lived  together  in  North  America  is  uncertain  ; 
so  far  there  is  no  evidence  to  show  that  they 
did,  although  the  absence  of  such  evidence  is 
no  proof  that  they  did  not.  That  any  live 
mammoth  has  for  centuries  been  seen  on  the 
Alaskan  tundras  is  utterly  improbable,  and  on 
Mr.  C.  H.  Townsend  seems  to  rest  the  respon- 
sibility of  having,  though  quite  unintentionally, 
introduced  the  Alaskan  Live  Mammoth  into 
the  columns  of  the  daily  press.  It  befell  in  this 
wise  :  Among  the  varied  duties  of  our  revenue 
marine  is  that  of  patrolling  and  exploring  the 
shores  of  arctic  Alaska  and  the  waters  of  the 
adjoining  sea,  and  it  is  not  so  many  years  ago 
that  the  cutter  Corwin,  if  memory  serves 


THE   MAMMOTH  191 

aright,  held  the  record  of  farthest  north  on  the 
Pacific  side.  On  one  of  these  northern  trips, 
to  the  Kotzebue  Sound  region,  famous  for  the 
abundance  of  its  deposits  of  mammoth  bones,* 
the  Corwin  carried  Mr.  Townsend,  then  natu- 
ralist to  the  United  States  Fish  Commission. 
At  Cape  Prince  of  Wales  some  natives  came 
on  board  bringing  a  few  bones  and  tusks  of 
the  mammoth,  and  upon  being  questioned  as 
to  whether  or  not  any  of  the  animals  to  which 
they  pertained  were  living,  promptly  replied 
that  all  were  dead,  inquiring  in  turn  if  the 
white  men  had  ever  seen  any,  and  if  they 
knew  how  these  animals,  so  vastly  larger  than 
a  reindeer,  looked. 

Fortunately,  or  unfortunately,  there  was  on 
board  a  text-book  of  geology  containing  the 
well-known  cut  of  the  St.  Petersburg  mam- 
moth, and  this  was  brought  forth,  greatly  to 
the  edification  of  the  natives,  who  were  de- 
lighted at  recognizing  the  curved  tusks  and 
the  bones  they  knew  so  well.  Next  the  na- 

*  Elephant  Point,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Buckland  River,  is  so 
named  from  the  numbers  of  mammoth  bones  which  have  accumu- 
lated there. 


192  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

lives  wished  to  know  what  the  outside  of  the 
creature  looked  like,  and  as  Mr.  Townsend 
had  been  at  Ward's  establishment  in  Roches- 
ter when  the  first  copy  of  the  Stuttgart  resto- 
ration was  made,  he  rose  to  the  emergency, 
and  made  a  sketch.  This  was  taken  ashore, 
together  with  a  copy  of  the  cut  of  the  skele- 
ton that  was  laboriously  made  by  an  Innuit 
sprawled  out  at  full  length  on  the  deck.  Now 
the  Innuits,  as  Mr.  Townsend  tells  us,  are 
great  gadabouts,  making  long  sledge  journeys 
in  winter  and  equally  long  trips  by  boat  in 
summer,  while  each  season  they  hold  a  regular 
fair  on  Kotzebue  Sound,  where  a  thousand  or 
two  natives  gather  to  barter  and  gossip.  On 
these  journeys  and  at  these  gatherings  the 
sketches  were  no  doubt  passed  about,  copied, 
and  recopied,  until  a  large  number  of  Innuits 
had  become  well  acquainted  with  the  appear- 
ance of  the  mammoth,  a  knowledge  that  natu- 
rally they  were  well  pleased  to  display  to  any 
white  visitors.  Also,  like  the  Celt,  the  Alas- 
kan native  delights  to  give  a  "  soft  answer," 
and  is  always  ready  to  furnish  the  kind  of  in- 
formation desired.  Thus  in  due  time  the  news- 


THE   MAMMOTH  193 

paper  man  learned  that  the  Alaskans  could 
make  pictures  of  the  mammoth,  and  that  they 
had  some  knowledge  of  its  size  and  habits  ;  so 
with  inference  and  logic  quite  as  good  as  that 
of  the  Tungusian  peasant,  the  reporter  came 
to  the  conclusion  that  somewhere  in  the  frozen 
wilderness  the  last  survivor  of  the  mammoths 
must  still  be  at  large.  And  so,  starting  on 
the  Pacific  coast,  the  Live  Mammoth  story 
wandered  from  paper  to  paper,  until  it  had 
spread  throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of 
the  United  States,  when  it  was  captured  by 
Mr.  Tukeman,  who  with  much  artistic  color 
and  some  realistic  touches,  transferred  it  to 
McClures  Magazine,  and  —  unfortunately  for 
the  officials  thereof —  to  the  Smithsonian  In- 
stitution. 

And  now,  once  for  all,  it  may  be  said  that 
there  is  no  mounted  mammoth  to  awe  the  visitor 
to  the  national  collections  or  to  any  other; 
and  yet  there  seems  no  good  and  conclusive 
reason  why  there  should  not  be.  True,  there 
are  no  live  mammoths  to  be  had  at  any  price  ; 
neither  are  their  carcasses  to  be  had  on  de- 
mand ;  still  there  is  good  reason  to  believe 


194  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

that  a  much  smaller  sum  than  that  said  to 
have  been  paid  by  Mr.  Conradi  for  the  mam- 
moth which  is  not  in  the  Smithsonian  Insti- 
tution, would  place  one  there.1*  It  probably 
could  not  be  done  in  one  year ;  it  might  not 
be  possible  in  five  years  ;  but  should  any  man 
of  means  wish  to  secure  enduring  fame  by 
showing  the  world  the  mammoth  as  it  stood  in 
life,  a  hundred  centuries  ago,  before  the  dawn 
of  even  tradition,  he  could  probably  accomplish 
the  result  by  the  expenditure  of  a  far  less  sum 
than  it  would  cost  to  participate  in  an  interna- 
tional yacht  race. 

*  Since  these  lines  were  written  another  Jlne  example  of  the 
Mammoth  has  been  discovered  in  Siberia  and  even  now  (Oct., 
1901)  an  expedition  is  on  its  way  to  secure  the  skin  and  skele- 
ton for  the  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  at  St.  Petersburg. 


THE   MAMMOTH  195 


REFERENCES 

The  mounted  skeleton  of  the  mammoth  in  the  museum 
of  the  Chicago  Academy  of  Science  is  still  the  only  one  on 
exhibition  in  the  United  States ;  this  specimen  is  probably 
the  Southern  Mammoth,  Elephas  columbi,  a  species,  or 
race,  characterized  by  its  great  size  and  the  coarse  struct- 
ure of  the  teeth.  Remains  of  the  mammoth  are  common 
enough  but,  save  in  Alaska,  they  are  usually  in  a  poor 
state  of  preservation  or  consist  of  isolated  bones  or  teeth. 
A  great  many  skeletons  of  mammoth  have  been  found  by 
gold  miners  in  Alaska,  and  with  proper  care  some  of 
these  could  undoubtedly  have  been  secured.  Naturally, 
however,  the  miners  do  not  feel  like  taking  the  time  and 
trouble  to  exhume  bones  whose  value  is  uncertain,  while 
the  cost  of  transportation  precludes  the  bringing  out  of 
many  specimens. 

Some  reports  of  mammoths  have  been  based  on  the 
bones  of  whales,  including  a  skull  that  was  Jigured  in 
the  daily  papers. 

Almost  every  museum  has  on  exhibition  teeth  of  the 
mammoth,  and  there  is  a  skull,  though  from  a  small  in- 
dividual, of  the  Southern  Mammoth  in  the  American 
Museum  of  Natural  History,  New  York. 

The  tusk  obtained  by  Mr.  Beach  and  mentioned  in 
the  text  still  holds  the  record  for  mammoth  tusks.  The 


196  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

greatest  development  of  tusks  occurred  in  Elephas  gane- 
sa,  a  species  found  in  Pliocene  deposits  of  the  Siwalik 
Hills,  India.  This  species  appears  not  to  have  exceeded 
the  existing  elephant  in  bulk,  but  the  tusks  are  twelve  feet 
nine  inches  long,  and  two  feet  two  inches  in  circumfer- 
ence. How  the  animal  ever  carried  them  is  a  mystery, 
both  on  account  of  their  size  and  their  enormous  leverage. 
As  for  teeth,  an  upper  grinder  of  Elephas  columbi  in  the 
United  States  National  Museum  is  ten  and  one-half 
inches  high,  nine  inches  wide,  the  grinding  face  being 
eight  by  five  inches.  This  tooth,  which  is  unusually  per- 
fect, retaining  the  outer  covering  of  cement,  came  from 
Afton,  Indian  Territory,  and  weighs  a  little  over  fifteen 
pounds.  The  lower  tooth,  shown  in  Fig.  38,  is  twelve 
inches  long,  and  the  grinding  face  is  nine  by  three  and 
one-half  inches;  this  is  also  from  Elephas  columbi. 
Grinders  of  the  Northern  Mammoth  are  smaller,  and  the 
plates  of  enamel  thinner,  and  closer  to  one  another. 
Mr.  F.  E.  Andrews,  of  Gunsight,  Texas,  reports  hav- 
ing found  a  femur,  or  thigh-bone  five  feet  four  inches 
long,  and  a  humerus  measuring  four  feet  three  inches, 
these  being  the  largest  bones  on  record  indicating  an 
animal  fourteen  feet  high. 

There  is  a  vast  amount  of  literature  relating  to  the 
mammoth,  some  of  it  very  untrustworthy.  A  list  of  all 
discoveries  of  specimens  in  thefiesh  is  given  by  Nordens- 


THE    MAMMOTH 


197 


kiold  in  "  The  Voyage  of  the  Vega,"  and  "  The  Mammoth 
and  the  Flood"  by  Sir  Henry  Howorth,  is  a  mine  of  in- 
formation. Mr.  Townsend^s  "Alaska  Live-Mammoth 
Story "  may  be  found  in  "  Forest  and  Stream "  for 
August  14,  1897. 


Fig.  37. — The  Mammoth  as  Engraved  by  a  Primitive 
Artist  on  a  Piece  of  Mammoth  Tusk. 


XI 

THE   MASTODON 

"  who  shall  place 

A  limit  to  the  giants  unchained  strength  ?  " 

The  name  mastodon  is  given  to  a  number  of 
species  of  fossil  elephants  differing  from  the 
true  elephants,  of  which  the  mammoth  is  an 
example,  in  the  structure  of  the  teeth.  In  the 
mastodons  the  crown,  or  grinding  face  of 
the  tooth,  is  formed  by  more  or  less  regular 
/^-shaped  cross  ridges,  covered  with  enamel, 
while  in  the  elephants  the  enamel  takes  the 
form  of  narrow,  pocket-shaped  plates,  set  up- 
right in  the  body  of  the  tooth.  Moreover,  in 
the  mastodons  the  roots  of  the  teeth  are  long 
prongs,  while  in  the  elephants  the  roots  are 
small  and  irregular.  A  glance  at  the  cuts  will 
show  these  distinctions  better  than  they  can 
be  explained  by  words.  Back  in  the  past,  how- 
ever, we  meet,  as  we  should  if  there  is  any  truth 

198 


THE    MASTODON 


199 


in  the  theory  of  evolution,  with  elephants  hav- 
ing an  intermediate  pattern  of  teeth. 

There  is  usually,  or  at  least  often,  another 
point  of  difference  between  elephants  and  mas- 
todons, for  many  of  the  latter  not  only  had 
tusks  in  the  upper,  but  in  the  lower  jaw,  and 
these  are  never  found  in  any  of  the  true  ele- 
phants. The  lower  tusks  are  longer  and  larger 


Fig.  38.  —  Tooth  of  Mastodon  and  of  Mammoth. 

in  the  earlier  species  of  mastodon  than  in 
those  of  more  recent  age  and  in  the  latest  spe- 
cies, the  common  American  mastodon,  the  lit- 
tle lower  tusks  were  usually  shed  early  in  life. 
These  afford  some  hints  of  the  relationships  of 
the  mastodon ;  for  in  Europe  are  found  re- 
mains of  a  huge  beast  well  called  Dinotheri- 
um,  or  terrible  animal,  which  possessed  lower 
tusks  only,  and  these,  instead  of  sticking  out 


200  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

from  the  jaw  are  bent  directly  downwards. 
No  perfect  skull  of  this  creature  has  yet  been 
found,  but  it  is  believed  to  have  had  a  short 
trunk.  For  a  long  time  nothing  but  the  skull 
was  known,  and  some  naturalists  thought  the 
animal  to  have  been  a  gigantic  manatee,  or  sea 
cow,  and  that  the  tusks  were  used  for  tearing 
food  from  the  bottom  of  rivers  and  for  anchor- 
ing the  animal  to  the  bank,  just  as  the  walrus 
uses  his  tusks  for  digging  clams  and  climbing 
out  upon  the  ice.  In  the  first  restorations  of 
Dinotherium  it  is  represented  lying  amidst 
reeds,  the  feet  concealed  from  view,  the  head 
alone  visible,  but  now  it  is  pictured  as  stand- 
ing erect,  for  the  discovery  of  massive  leg- 
bones  has  definitely  settled  the  question  as  to 
whether  it  did  or  did  not  have  limbs. 

There  is  another  hint  of  relationship  in  the 
upper  tusks  of  the  earlier  mastodons,  and  this 
is  the  presence  of  a  band  of  enamel  running 
down  each  tusk.  In  all  gnawing  animals  the 
front,  cutting  teeth  are  formed  of  soft  dentine, 
or  ivory,  faced  with  a  plate  of  enamel,  just  as 
the  blade  of  a  chisel  or  plane  is  formed  of  a 
plate  of  tempered  steel  backed  with  soft  iron  ; 


THE    MASTODON  201 

the  object  of  this  being  the  same  in  both  tooth 
and  chisel,  to  keep  the  edge  sharp  by  wearing 
away  the  softer  material.  In  the  case  of  the 
chisel  this  is  done  by  a  man  with  a  grindstone, 
but  with  the  tooth  it  is  performed  automat- 
ically and  more  pleasantly  by  the  gnawing  of 
food.  In  the  mastodon  and  elephant  the  tusks, 
which  are  the  representatives  of  the  cutting 
teeth  of  rodents,  are  wide  apart,  and  of  course 
do  not  gnaw  anything,  but  the  presence  of 
these  enamel  bands  hints  at  a  time  when  they 
and  their  owner  were  smaller  and  differently 
shaped,  and  the  teeth  were  used  for  cutting. 
Thus,  great  though  the  disparity  of  size  may 
be,  there  is  a  suggestion  that  through  the  mas- 
todon the  elephant  is  distantly  related  to  the 
mouse,  and  that,  could  we  trace  their  respec- 
tive pedigrees  far  enough,  we  might  find  a  com- 
mon ancestor. 

This  presence  of  structures  that  are  appar- 
ently of  no  use,  often  worse  than  useless,  is 
regarded  as  the  survival  of  characters  that  once 
served  some  good  purpose,  like  the  familiar 
buttons  on  the  sleeve  or  at  the  back  of  a  man's 
coat,  or  the  bows  and  ruffles  on  a  woman's 


202  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

dress.  We  are  told  that  these  are  put  on  "  to 
make  the  dress  look  pretty,"  but  the  student 
regards  the  bows  as  vestiges  of  the  time  when 
there  were  no  buttons  and  hooks  and  eyes  had 
not  been  invented,  and  dresses  were  tied  to- 
gether with  strings  or  ribbons.  As  for  ruffles, 
they  took  the  place  of  flounces,  and  flounces 
are  vestiges  of  the  time  when  a  young  woman 
wore  the  greater  part  of  her  wardrobe  on  her 
back,  putting  on  one  dress  above  another,  the 
bottoms  of  the  skirts  showing  like  so  many 
flounces.  So  buttons,  ruffles,  and  the  vermi- 
form appendix  of  which  we  hear  so  much  all 
fall  in  the  category  of  vestigial  structures. 

Where  the  mastodons  originated,  we  know 
not:  Seftor  Ameghino  thinks  their  ancestors 
are  to  be  found  in  Patagonia,  and  he  is  very 
probably  wrong ;  Professor  Cope  thought  they 
came  from  Asia,  and  he  is  probably  right ;  or 
they  may  have  immigrated  from  the  conven- 
ient Antarctica,  which  is  called  up  to  account 
for  various  facts  in  the  distribution  of  animals.* 

*  During  the  past  year,  1901,  Mr.  C.  W.  Andrews  of  the 
British  Museum  has  discovered  in  Egypt  a  small  and  primitive 
species  oj  mastodon,  also  the  remains  of  another  animal  which  he 


THE   MASTODON  203 

Neither  do  we  at  present  know  just  how  many 
species  of  mastodons  there  may  have  been  in 
the  Western  Hemisphere,  for  most  of  them  are 
known  from  scattered  teeth,  single  jaws,  and 
odd  bones,  so  that  we  cannot  tell  just  what  dif- 
ferences may  be  due  to  sex  or  individual  varia- 
tion. It  is  certain,  however,  that  several  dis- 
tinct kinds,  or  species,  have  inhabited  various 
parts  of  North  America,  while  remains  of  others 
occur  in  South  America.  The  mastodon,  how- 
ever, the  one  most  recent  in  point  of  time,  and 
the  best  known  because  its  remains  are  scat- 
tered far  and  wide  over  pretty  much  the  length 
and  breadth  of  the  United  States,  and  are 
found  also  in  southern  and  western  Canada, 
is  the  well-named  Mastodon  americanus*  and 
unless  otherwise  specified  this  alone  will  be 
meant  when  the  name  mastodon  is  used.  In 
some  localities  the  mastodon  seems  to  have 
abounded,  but  between  the  Hudson  and  Con- 
necticut Rivers  indications  of  its  former  pres- 

thinks  may  be  the  long  sought  ancestor  of  the  elephant  family, 
which  includes  the  mammoth  and  mastodon. 

*  This  has  also  been  called  giganteus  and  ohioticus,  but  the 
name  americanus  claims  priority,  and  should  therefore  be  used. 


204  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

ence  are  rare,  and  east  of  that  they  are  practi- 
cally wanting.  The  best  preserved  specimens 
come  from  Ulster  and  Orange  Counties,  New 
York,  for  these  seem  to  have  furnished  the 
animal  with  the  best  facilities  for  getting  mired. 
Just  west  of  the  Catskills,  parallel  with  the 
valley  of  the  Hudson,  is  a  series  of  meadows, 
bogs,  and  pools  marking  the  sites  of  swamps 
that  came  into  existence  after  the  recession  of 
the  mighty  ice- sheet  that  long  covered  eastern 
North  America,  and  in  these  many  a  masto- 
don, seeking  for  food  or  water,  or  merely  wal- 
lowing in  the  mud,  stuck  fast  and  perished 
miserably.  And  here  to-day  the  spade  of  the 
farmer  as  he  sinks  a  ditch  to  drain  what  is  left 
of  some  beaver  pond  of  bygone  days,  strikes 
some  bone  as  brown  and  rugged  as  a  root,  so 
like  a  piece  of  water-soaked  wood  that  nine 
times  out  of  ten  it  is  taken  for  a  fragment  of 
tree-trunk. 

The  first  notice  of  the  mastodon  in  North 
America  goes  back  to  1712,  and  is  found  in  a 
letter  from  Cotton  Mather  to  Dr.  Woodward 
(of  England?)  written  at  Boston  on  November 
17th,  in  which  he  speaks  of  a  large  work  in 


THE    MASTODON  205 

manuscript  entitled  Biblia  Americana,  and 
gives  as  a  sample  a  note  on  the  passage  in  Gen- 
esis (VI.  4)  in  which  we  read  that  "  there 
were  giants  in  the  earth  in  those  days."  We 
are  told  that  this  is  confirmed  by  "  the  bones 
and  teeth  of  some  large  animal  found  lately  in 
Albany,  in  New  England,  which  for  some 
reason  he  thinks  to  be  human ;  particularly  a 
tooth  brought  from  the  place  where  it  was 
found  to  New  York  in  1705,  being  a  very  large 
grinder,  weighing  four  pounds  and  three  quar- 
ters ;  with  a  bone  supposed  to  be  a  thigh-bone, 
seventeen  feet  long,"  the  total  length  of  the 
body  being  taken  as  seventy-five  feet.  Thus 
bones  of  the  mastodon,  as  well  as  those  of  the 
mammoth,  have  done  duty  as  those  of  giants. 
And  as  the  first  mastodon  remains  recorded 
from  North  America  came  from  the  region 
west  of  the  Hudson,  so  the  first  fairly  com- 
plete skeleton  also  came  from  that  locality, 
secured  at  a  very  considerable  outlay  of  money 
and  a  still  more  considerable  expenditure  of 
labor  by  the  exertions  of  C.  W.  Peale.  This 
specimen  was  described  at  some  length  by 
Rembrandt  Peale  in  a  privately  printed  pam- 


206  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

phlet,  now  unfortunately  rare,  and  described 
in  some  respects  better  than  has  been  done  by 
any  subsequent  writer,  since  the  points  of  dif- 
ference between  various  parts  of  the  mastodon 
and  elephant  were  clearly  pointed  out.  This 
skeleton  was  exhibited  in  London,  and  after- 
wards at  Peale's  Museum  in  Philadelphia 
where,  with  much  other  valuable  material,  it 
was  destroyed  by  fire. 

Struck  by  the  evident  crushing  power  of  the 
great  ridged  molars,  Peale  was  led  to  believe 
that  the  mastodon  was  a  creature  of  carnivor- 
ous habits,  and  so  described  it,  but  this  error 
is  excusable,  the  more  that  to  this  day,  when 
the  mastodon  is  well  known,  and  its  description 
published  time  and  again  in  the  daily  papers, 
finders  of  the  teeth  often  consider  them  as  be- 
longing to  some  huge  beast  of  prey. 

Since  the  time  of  Peale  several  fine  speci- 
mens have  been  taken  from  Ulster  and  Orange 
Counties,  among  them  the  well-known  "  War- 
ren Mastodon,"  and  there  is  not  the  slightest 
doubt  that  many  more  will  be  recovered  from 
the  meadows,  swamps,  and  pond  holes  of  these 
two  counties. 


208  ANIMALS    OF   THE    PAST 

The  next  mastodon  to  appear  on  the  scene 
was  the  so-called  Missourium  of  Albert  Koch, 
which  he  constructed  somewhat  as  he  did  the 
Hydrarchus  (see  p.  61)  of  several  individuals 
pieced  together,  thus  forming  a  skeleton  that 
was  a  monster  in  more  ways  than  one.  To 
heighten  the  effect,  the  curved  tusks  were  so 
placed  that  they  stood  out  at  right  angles  to 
the  sides  of  the  head,  like  the  swords  upon 
the  axles  of  ancient  war  chariots.  Like  Peale's 
specimen  this  was  exhibited  in  London,  and 
there  it  still  remains,  for,  stripped  of  its  super- 
fluous bones,  and  remounted,  it  may  now  be 
seen  in  the  British  Museum. 

Many  a  mastodon  has  come  to  light  since 
the  time  of  Koch,  for  while  it  is  commonly 
supposed  that  remains  of  the  animal  are  great 
rarities,  as  a  matter  of  fact  they  are  quite 
common,  and  it  may  safely  be  said  that  during 
the  seasons  of  ditching,  draining,  and  well-dig- 
ging not  a  week  passes  without  one  or  more 
mastodons  bein'g  unearthed.  Not  that  these 
are  complete  skeletons,  very  far  from  it,  the 
majority  of  finds  are  scattered  teeth,  crum- 
bling tusks,  or  massive  leg-bones,  but  still  the 


THE   MASTODON  209 

mastodon  is  far  commoner  in  the  museums  of 
this  country  than  is  the  African  elephant,  for 
at  the  present  date  there  are  eleven  of  the 
former  to  one  of  the  latter,  the  single  skeleton 
of  African  elephant  being  that  of  Jumbo  in 
the  American  Museum  of  Natural  History. 
If  one  may  judge  by  the  abundance  of  bones, 
mastodons  must  have  been  very  numerous 
in  some  favored  localities  such  as  parts  of 
Michigan,  Florida,  and  Missouri  and  about 
Big  Bone  Lick,  Ky.  Perhaps  the  most  note- 
worthy of  all  deposits  is  that  at  Kimmswick, 
about  twenty  miles  south  of  St.  Louis,  where 
in  a  limited  area  Mr.  L.  W.  Beehler  has  ex- 
humed bones  representing  several  hundred 
individuals,  varying  in  size  from  a  mere  baby 
mastodon  up  to  the  great  tusker  whose  worn- 
out  teeth  proclaim  that  he  had  reached  the 
limit  of  even  mastodonic  old  age.  The  spot 
where  this  remarkable  deposit  was  found  is  at 
the  foot  of  a  bluff  near  the  junction  of  two 
little  streams,  and  it  seems  probable  that  in 
the  days  when  these  were  larger  the  spring 
floods  swept  down  the  bodies  of  animals  that 
had  perished  during  the  winter  to  ground  in 


210  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

an  eddy  beneath  the  bluff.  Or  as  the  place 
abounds  in  springs  of  sulphur  and  salt  water 
it  may  be  that  this  was  where  the  animals 
assembled  during  cold  weather,  just  as  the 
moas  are  believed  to  have  gathered  in  the 
swamps  of  New  Zealand,  and  here  the  weaker 
died  and  left  their  bones. 

The  mastodon  must  have  looked  very  much 
like  any  other  elephant,  though  a  little  shorter 
in  the  legs  and  somewhat  more  heavily  built 
than  either  of  the  living  species,  while  the 
head  was  a  trifle  flatter  and  the  jaw  decidedly 
longer.  The  tusks  are  a  variable  quantity, 
sometimes  merely  bowing  outwards,  often 
curving  upwards  to  form  a  half  circle ;  they 
were  never  so  long  as  the  largest  mammoth 
tusks,  but  to  make  up  for  this  they  were  a 
shade  stouter  for  their  length.  As  the  masto- 
don ranged  well  to  the  north  it  is  fair  to  sup- 
pose that  he  may  have  been  covered  with  long 
hair,  a  supposition  that  seems  to  be  borne  out 
by  the  discovery,  noted  by  Rembrandt  Peale,  of 
a  mass  of  long,  coarse,  woolly  hair  buried  in  one 
of  the  swamps  of  Ulster  County,  New  York. 
And  with  these  facts  in  mind,  aided  by  photo- 


THE   MASTODON  211 

graphs  of  various  skeletons  of  mastodons,  Mr. 
Gleeson  made  the  restoration  which  accom- 
panies this  chapter. 

As  for  the  size  of  the  mastodon,  this,  like 
that  of  the  mammoth,  is  popularly  much  over- 
estimated, and  it  is  more  than  doubtful  if  any 
attained  the  height  of  a  full-grown  African 
elephant.  The  largest  femur,  or  thigh-bone, 
that  has  come  under  the  writer's  notice  was 
one  he  measured  as  it  lay  in  the  earth  at 
Kimmswick,  and  this  was  just  four  feet  long, 
three  inches  shorter  than  the  thigh-bone  of 
Jumbo.  Several  of  the  largest  thigh-bones 
measured  show  so  striking  an  unanimity  in 
size,  between  46  and  47  inches  in  length,  that 
we  may  be  pretty  sure  they  represent  the  aver- 
age old  "  bull "  mastodon,  and  if  we  say  that 
these  animals  stood  ten  feet  high  we  are 
probably  doing  them  full  justice.  An  occa- 
sional tusk  reaches  a  length  of  ten  feet,  but 
seven  or  eight  is  the  usual  size,  with  a  diameter 
of  as  many  inches,  and  this  is  no  larger  than 
the  tusks  of  the  African  elephant  would  grow 
if  they  had  a  chance.  It  is  painful  to  be 
obliged  to  scale  down  the  mastodon  as  we  have 


212  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

just  done  the  mammoth,  but  if  any  reader 
knows  of  specimens  larger  than  those  noted, 
he  should  by  all  means  publish  their  measure- 
ments.* 

The  disappearance  of  the  mastodon  is  as  dif- 
ficult to  account  for  as  that  of  the  mammoth, 
and,  as  will  be  noted,  there  is  absolutely  no 
evidence  to  show  that  man  had  any  hand  in  it. 
Neither  can  it  be  ascribed  to  change  of  climate, 
for  the  mastodon,  as  indicated  by  the  wide  dis- 
tribution of  its  bones,  was  apparently  adapted 
to  a  great  diversity  of  climates,  and  was  as 
much  at  home  amid  the  cool  swamps  of  Mich- 
igan and  New  York  as  on  the  warm  savannas 
of  Florida  and  Louisiana.  Certainly  the  much 
used,  and  abused,  glacial  epoch  cannot  be  held 
accountable  for  the  extermination  of  the  creat- 
ure, for  the  mastodon  came  into  New  York 
after  the  recession  of  the  great  ice-sheet,  and 
tarried  to  so  late  a  date  that  bones  buried  in 

*  As  skeletons  are  sometimes  mounted,  they  stand  a  full  foot 
or  more  higher  at  the  shoulders  than  the  animal  stood  in  life, 
this  being  caused  by  raising  the  body  until  the  shoulder-blades 
are  far  below  the  tips  of  the  vertebrae,  a  position  they  never  as- 
sume in  life. 


THE   MASTODON  213 

the  swamps  retain  much  of  their  animal  mat- 
ter. So  recent,  comparatively  speaking,  has 
been  the  disappearance  of  the  mastodon,  and 
so  fresh-looking  are  some  of  its  bones,  that 
Thomas  Jefferson  thought  in  his  day  that  it 
might  still  be  living  in  some  part  of  the  then 
unexplored  Northwest. 

It  is  a  moot  question  whether  or  not  man 
and  the  mastodon  were  contemporaries  in 
North  America,  and  while  many  there  be  who, 
like  the  writer  of  these  lines,  believe  that  this 
was  the  case,  an  expression  of  belief  is  not  a 
demonstration  of  fact.  The  best  that  can  be 
said  is  that  there  are  scattered  bits  of  testi- 
mony, slight  though  they  are,  which  seem  to 
point  that  way,  but  no  one  so  strong  by  itself 
that  it  could  not  be  shaken  by  sharp  cross- 
questioning  and  enable  man  to  prove  an  alibi 
in  a  trial  by  jury.  For  example,  in  the  great 
bone  deposit  at  Kimmswick,  Mo.,  Mr.  Beehler 
found  a  flint  arrowhead,  but  this  may  have  lain 
just  over  the  bone-bearing  layer,  or  have  got 
in  by  some  accident  in  excavating.  How  easily 
a  mistake  may  be  made  is  shown  by  the  report 
sent  to  the  United  States  National  Museum  of 


214  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

many  arrowheads  associated  with  mastodon 
bones  in  a  spring  at  Afton,  Indian  Territory. 
This  spring  was  investigated,  and  a  few  masto- 
don bones  and  flint  arrowheads  were  found, 
but  the  latter  were  in  a  stratum  just  above  the 
bones,  although  this  was  overlooked  by  the  first 
diggers.*  Koch  reported  finding  charcoal  and 
arrowheads  so  associated  with  mastodon  bones 
that  he  inferred  the  animal  to  have  been  de- 
stroyed by  fire  and  arrows  after  it  became 
mired.  It  has  been  said  that  Koch  could  have 
had  no  object  in  disseminating  this  report,  and 
hence  that  it  may  be  credited,  but  he  had  just 
as  much  interest  in  doing  this  as  he  did  in  fab- 
ricating the  Hydrarchus  and  the  Missourium, 
and  his  testimony  is  not  to  be  considered  se- 
riously. It  seems  to  be  with  the  mastodon 
much  as  it  is  with  the  sea-serpent ;  the  latter 
never  appears  to  a  naturalist,  remains  of  the 
former  are  never  found  by  a  trained  observer 

*  This  locality  has  just  been  carefully  investigated  by  Mr. 
W.  H.  Holmes  of  the  United  States  National  Museum  who 
found  bones  of  the  mastodon  and  Southern  Mammoth  associated 
with  arrowheads.  But  he  also  found  fresh  bones  of  bison, 
horse,  and  wolf,  showing  that  these  and  the  arrowheads  had 
simply  sunk  to  the  level  of  the  older  deposit. 


THE   MASTODON  215 

associated  with  indications  of  the  presence  of 
man.  Perhaps  an  exception  should  be  made 
in  the  case  of  Professor  J.  M.  Clarke,  who 
found  fragments  of  charcoal  in  a  deposit  of 
muck  under  some  bones  of  mastodon. 

We  may  pass  by  the  so-called  "  Elephant 
Mound,"  which  to  the  eye  of  an  unimaginative 
observer  looks  as  if  it  might  have  been  in- 
tended for  any  one  of  several  beasts  ;  also,  with 
bated  breath  and  due  respect  for  the  bitter  con- 
troversy waged  over  them,  pass  we  by  the  ele- 
phant pipes.  There  remains,  then,  not  a  bit 
of  man's  handiwork,  not  a  piece  of  pottery,  en- 
graved stone,  or  scratched  bone  that  can  un- 
hesitatingly be  said  to  have  been  wrought  into 
the  shape  of  an  elephant  before  the  coming  of 
the  white  man.  True,  there  is  "  The  Lenape 
Stone,"  found  near  Doyleston,  Pa.,  in  1872, 
a  gorget  graven  on  one  side  with  the  represen- 
tation of  men  attacking  an  elephant,  while  the 
other  bears  a  number  of  figures  of  various  an- 
imals. The  good  faith  of  the  finder  of  this 
stone  is  unimpeachable,  but  it  is  a  curious  fact 
that,  while  this  gorget  is  elaborately  decorated 
on  both  sides,  no  similar  stone,  out  of  all  that 


216  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

have  been  found,  bears  any  image  whatsoever. 
On  the  other  hand,  if  not  made  by  the  aborig- 
ines, who  made  it,  why  was  it  made,  and  why 
did  nine  years  elapse  between  the  discovery  of 
the  first  and  second  portions  of  the  broken  or- 
nament ?  These  are  questions  the  reader  may 
decide  for  himself;  the  author  will  only  say 
that  to  his  mind  the  drawing  is  too  elaborate, 
and  depicts  entirely  too  much  to  have  been 
made  by  a  primitive  artist.  A  much  better  bit 
of  testimony  seems  to  be  presented  by  a  frag- 
ment of  Fulgur  shell  found  near  Hollyoak, 
Del,  and  now  in  the  United  States  National 
Museum,  which  bears  a  very  rudely  scratched 
image  of  an  animal  that  may  have  been  in- 
tended for  a  mastodon  or  a  bison.  This  piece 
of  shell  is  undeniably  old,  but  there  is,  unfort- 
unately, the  uncertainty  just  mentioned  as  to 
the  animal  depicted.  The  familiar  legend  of 
the  Big  Buffalo  that  destroyed  animals  and 
men  and  defied  even  the  lightnings  of  the 
Great  Spirit  has  been  thought  by  some  to 
have  originated  in  a  tradition  of  the  mastodon 
handed  down  from  ancient  times ;  but  why 
consider  that  the  mastodon  is  meant  ?  Why 


THE    MASTODON  217 

not  a  legendary  bison  that  has  increased  with 
years  of  story- telling  ?  And  so  the  co-exist- 
ence of  man  and  mastodon  must  rest  as  a  case 
of  not  proven,  although  there  is  a  strong  prob- 
ability that  the  two  did  live  together  in  the 
dim  ages  of  the  past,  and  some  day  the  evi- 
dence may  come  to  light  that  will  prove  it  be- 
yond a  peradventure.  If  scientific  men  are 
charged  with  obstinacy  and  unwarranted  in- 
credulity in  declining  to  accept  the  testimony 
so  far  presented,  it  must  be  remembered  that 
the  evidence  as  to  the  existence  of  the  sea 
serpent  is  far  stronger,  since  it  rests  on  the  tes- 
timony of  eye-witnesses,  and  yet  the  creature 
himself  has  never  been  seen  by  a  trained  ob- 
server, nor  has  any  specimen,  not  a  scale,  a 
tooth,  or  a  bone,  ever  made  its  way  into  any 
museum. 

REFERENCES 

There  are  at  least  eleven  mounted  skeletons  of  the 
Mastodon  in  the  United  States,  and  the  writer  trusts  he 
may  be  pardoned  for  mentioning  only  those  which  are 
most  accessible.  These  are  in  the  American  Museum  of 
Natural  History,  New  York;  the  State  Museum,  Al- 


218  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

bany,  N.  Y. ;  Field  Columbian  Museum,  Chicago ;  Car- 
negie Museum,  Pittsburgh  Museum  of  Comparative 
Zoology,  Cambridge,  Mass.  There  is  no  mounted  skele- 
ton in  the  United  States  National  Museum,  nor  has  there 
ever  been. 

The  heaviest  pair  of  tusks  is  in  the  possession  of  T.  O. 
Tuttle,  Seneca,  Mich.,  and  they  are  nine  and  one-half 
inches  in  diameter,  and  a  little  over  eight  feet  long; 
very  few  tusks,  however,  reach  eight  inches  in  diameter. 
The  thigh-bone  of  an  old  male  mastodon  measures  from 
forty-Jive  to  forty-six  and  one-half  inches  long,  the  hu- 
mer us  from  thirty-Jive  to  forty  inches.  The  height  of 
the  mounted  skeleton  is  of  little  value  as  an  indication  of 
size,  since  it  depends  so  much  upon  the  manner  in  which 
the  skeleton  is  mounted.  The  grinders  of  the  mastodon 
have  three  cross  ridges,  save  the  last,  which  has  four,  and 
a  Jinal  elevation,  or  heel.  This  does  not  apply  to  the 
teeth  of  very  young  animals.  The  presence  or  absence 
of  the  last  grinder  will  show  whether  or  not  the  animal  is 
of  full  age  and  size,  while  the  amount  of  wear  indicates 
the  comparative  age  of  the  specimen. 

The  skeleton  of  the  "  Warren  Mastodon  "  is  described 
at  length  by  Dr.  J.  C.  Warren,  in  a  quarto  volume  en- 
titled "  Mastodon  Giganteus."  There  is  much  informa- 
tion in  a  little  book  by  J.  P.  MacLean,  "  Mastodon, 
Mammoth,  and  Man,"  but  the  reader  must  not  accept  all 
its  statements  unhesitatingly.  The  Jirst  volume,  1887, 


THE    MASTODON 


219 


of  the  New  Scribners  Magazine  contains  an  article  on 
"  American  Elephant  Myths?  by  Professor  W.  B.  Scott, 
but  he  is  under  an  erroneous  impression  regarding  the 
size  of  the  mastodon,  and  photographs  of  the  Maya 
carvings  show  that  their  resemblance  to  elephants  has  been 
exaggerated  in  the  wood  cuts.  The  story  of  the  Lenape 
Stone  is  told  at  length  by  H.  C.  Mercer  in  "  The  Lenape 
Stone,  or  the  Indian  and  the  Mammoth" 


Fig.  4 1 .  —  The  Lenape  Stone,  Reduced. 


XII 

WHY   DO   ANIMALS   BECOME   EXTINCT? 

"And  Sultan  after  Sultan  with  his  Pomp 
Abode  his  destined  Hour  and  went  his  way." 


IT  is  often  asked  "  why  do  anini^ls  become  ex- 
tinct ? "  but  the  question  is  one  to  which  it  is 
impossible  to  give  a  comprehensive  and  satis- 
factory reply ;  this  chapter  does  not  pretend 
to  do  so,  merely  to  present  a  few  aspects  of 
this  complicated,  many-sided  problem. 

In  very  many  cases  it  may  be  said  that  act- 
ual extermination  has  not  taken  place,  but 
that  in  the  course  of  evolution  one  species  has 
passed  into  another;  species  may  have  been 
lost,  but  the  race,  or  phylum  endures,  just  as 
in  the  growth  of  a  tree,  the  twigs  and  branches 
of  the  sapling  disappear,  while  the  tree,  as  a 
whole,  grows  onward  and  upward.  This  is 
what  we  see  in  the  horse,  which  is  the  living 
representative  of  ai\  unbroken  line  reaching 


WHY    DO   ANIMALS    BECOME    EXTINCT?     221 

back  to  the  little  Eocene  Hyracothere.  So  in 
a  general  way  it  may  be  said  that  much  of 
what  at  the  first  glance  we  might  term  extinc- 
tion is  really  the  replacement  of  one  set  of 
animals  by  another  better  adapted  to  surround- 
ing conditions. 

Again,  there  are  many  cases  of  animals,  and 
particularly  of  large  animals,  so  peculiar  in 
their  make  up,  so  very  obviously  adapted  to 
their  own  special  surroundings  that  it  requires 
little  imagination  to  see  that  it  would  have 
been  a  difficult  matter  for  them  to  have  re- 
sponded to  even  a  slight  change  in  the  world 
about  them.  Such  great  and  necessarily  slug- 
gish brutes  as  Brontosaurus  and  Diplodocus, 
with  their  tons  of  flesh,  small  heads,  and  feeble 
teeth,  were  obviously  reared  in  easy  circum- 
stances, and  unfitted  to  succeed  in  any  strenu- 
ous struggle  for  existence.  Stegosaurus,  with 
his  bizarre  array  of  plates  and  spines,  and  huge- 
headed  Triceratops,  had  evidently  carried  spe- 
cialization to  an  extreme,  while  in  turn  the 
carnivorous  forms  must  have  required  an  abun- 
dant supply  of  slow  and  easily  captured  prey. 

Coming  down  to  a  more  recent  epoch,  when 


222  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

the  big  Titanotheres  flourished,  it  is  easy  to  see 
from  a  glance  at  their  large,  simple  teeth 
that  these  beasts  needed  an  ample  provision  of 
coarse  vegetation,  and  as  they  seem  never  to 
have  spread  far  beyond  their  birthplace,  cli- 
matic change,  modifying  even  a  comparatively 
limited  area,  would  suffice  to  sweep  them  out 
of  existence.  To  use  the  epitaph  proposed  by 
Professor  Marsh  for  the  tombstone  of  one  of 
the  Dinosaurs,  many  a  beast  might  say,  "  I, 
and  my  race  perished  of  over  specialization." 
To  revert  to  the  horse  it  will  be  remembered 
that  this  very  fate  is  believed  to  have  overtaken 
those  almost  horses  the  European  Hippotheres ; 
they  reached  a  point  where  no  further  progress 
was  possible,  and  fell  by  the  wayside. 

There  is,  however,  still  another  class  of  cases 
where  species,  families,  orders,  even,  seem  to 
have  passed  out  of  existence  without  sufficient 
cause.  Those  great  marine  reptiles,  the  Ich- 
thyosaurs,  of  Europe,  the  Plesiosaurs  and  Mo- 
sasaurs,  of  our  own  continent,  seem  to  have 
been  just  as  well  adapted  to  an  aquatic  life  as 
the  whales,  and  even  better  than  the  seals,  and 
we  can  see  no  reason  why  Columbus  should 


WHY   DO   ANIMALS   BECOME   EXTINCT?     223 

not  have  found  these  creatures  still  disporting 
themselves  in  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  The  best 
we  can  do  is  to  fall  back  on  an  unknown  "  law 
of  progress,"  and  say  that  the  trend  of  life  is 
toward  the  replacement  of  large,  lower  animals 
by  those  smaller  and  intellectually  higher. 

But  why  there  should  be  an  allotted  course 
to  any  group  of  animals,  why  some  species 
come  to  an  end  when  they  are  seemingly  as 
well  fitted  to  endure  as  others  now  living,  we 
do  not  know,  and  if  we  say  that  a  time  comes 
when  the  germ-plasm  is  incapable  of  further 
subdivision,  we  merely  express  our  ignorance 
in  an  unnecessary  number  of  words.  The 
mammoth  and  mastodon  have  already  been 
cited  as  instances  of  animals  that  have  unac- 
countably become  extinct,  and  these  examples 
are  chosen  from  among  many  on  account  of 
their  striking  nature.  The  great  ground  sloths, 
the  Mylodons,  Megatheres,  and  their  allies,  are 
another  case  in  point.  At  one  period  or  an- 
other they  reached  from  Oregon  to  Virginia, 
Florida,  and  Patagonia,  though  it  is  not 
claimed  that  they  covered  all  this  area  at  one 
time.  And,  while  it  may  be  freely  admitted 


224  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

that  in  some  portions  of  their  range  they  may 
have  been  extirpated  by  a  change  in  food-sup- 
ply, due  in  turn  to  a  change  in  climate,  it  seems 
preposterous  to  claim  that  there  was  not  at  all 
times,  somewhere  in  this  vast  expanse  of  terri- 
tory, a  climate  mild  enough  and  a  food-supply 
large  enough  for  the  support  of  even  these 
huge,  sluggish  creatures.  We  may  evoke  the 
aid  of  primitive  man  to  account  for  the  disap- 
pearance of  this  race  of  giants,  and  we  know 
that  the  two  were  coeval  in  Patagonia,  where 
the  sloths  seem  to  have  played  the  role  of  do- 
mesticated animals,  but  again  it  seems  incred- 
ible that  early  man,  with  his  flint-tipped  spears 
and  arrows,  should  have  been  able  to  slay  even 
such  slow  beasts  as  these  to  the  very  last  indi- 
vidual. 

Of  course,  in  modern  times  man  has  directly 
exterminated  many  animals,  while  by  the  in- 
troduction of  dogs,  cats,  pigs,  and  goats  he  has 
indirectly  not  only  thinned  the  ranks  of  ani- 
mals, but  destroyed  plant  life  on  an  enormous 
scale.  But  in  the  past  man's  capabilities  for 
harm  were  infinitely  less  than  now,  while  of 
course  the  greatest  changes  took  place  before 


WHY    DO    ANIMALS    BECOME   EXTINCT?     225 

man  even  existed,  so  that,  while  he  is  responsi- 
ble for  the  great  changes  that  have  taken  place 
in  the  world's  flora  and  fauna  during  recent 
times,  his  influence,  as  a  whole,  has  been  insig- 
nificant. Thus,  while  man  exterminated  the 
great  northern  sea-cow,  Rytina,  and  Pallas's 
cormorant  on  the  Commander  Islands,  these 
animals  were  already  restricted  to  this  circum- 
scribed area*  by  natural  causes,  so  that  man 
but  finished  what  nature  had  begun.  The  ex- 
termination of  the  great  auk  in  European 
waters  was  somewhat  similar.  There  is,  how- 
ever, this  unfortunate  difference  between  ex- 
termination wrought  by  man  and  that  brought 
about  by  natural  causes  :  the  extermination  of 
species  by  nature  is  ordinarily  slow,  and  the 
place  of  one  is  taken  by  another,  while  the  de- 
struction wrought  by  man  is  rapid,  and  the  gaps 
he  creates  remain  unfilled. 

Not  so  very  long  ago  it  was  customary  to 
account  for  changes  in  the  past  life  of  the 
globe  by  earthquakes,  volcanic  outbursts,  or 

*  It  is  possible  that  the  cormorant  may  always  have  been  con- 
Jined  to  this  one  spot,  but  this  is  probably  not  the  case  with  the 
sea-cow. 


226  ANIMALS   OF  THE   PAST 

cataclysms  of  such  appalling  magnitude  that 
the  whole  face  of  nature  was  changed,  and  en- 
tire races  of  living  beings  swept  out  of  exist- 
ence at  once.  But  it  is  now  generally  conceded 
that  while  catastrophes  have  occurred,  yet,  vast 
as  they  may  have  been,  their  effects  were  com- 
paratively local,  and,  while  the  life  of  a  limited 
region  may  have  been  ruthlessly  blotted  out, 
life  as  a  whole  was  but  little  affected.  The 
eruption  of  Krakatoa  shook  the  earth  to  its  cen- 
tre and  was  felt  for  hundreds  of  miles  around, 
yet,  while  it  caused  the  death  of  thousands  of 
living  beings,  it  remains  to  be  shown  that  it 
produced  any  effect  on  the  life  of  the  region 
taken  in  its  entirety. 

Changes  in  the  life  of  the  globe  have  been  in 
the  main  slow  and  gradual,  and  in  response  to 
correspondingly  slow  changes  in  the  level  of 
portions  of  the  earth's  crust,  with  their  far- 
reaching  effects  on  temperature,  climate,  and 
vegetation.  Animals  that  were  what  is  termed 
plastic  kept  pace  with  the  altering  conditions 
about  them  and  became  modified,  too,  while 
those  that  could  not  adapt  themselves  to  their 
surroundings  died  out. 


WHY   DO   ANIMALS   BECOME   EXTINCT?     227 

How  slowly  changes  may  take  place  is 
shown  by  the  occurrence  of  a  depression  in  the 
Isthmus  of  Panama,  in  comparatively  recent 
geologic  time,  permitting  free  communication 
between  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific,  a  sort  of  nat- 
ural inter-oceanic  canal.  And  yet  the  altera- 
tions wrought  by  this  were,  so  to  speak,  super- 
ficial, affecting  only  some  species  of  shore  fishes 
and  invertebrates,  having  no  influence  on  the 
animals  of  the  deeper  waters.  Again,  on  the 
Pacific  coast  are  now  found  a  number  of  shells 
that,  as  we  learn  from  fossils,  were  in  Pliocene 
time  common  on  both  coasts  of  the  United 
States,  and  Mr.  Dall  interprets  this  to  mean 
that  when  this  continent  was  rising,  the  steeper 
shore  on  the  Pacific  side  permitted  the  shell-fish 
to  move  downward  and  adapt  themselves  to 
the  ever  changing  shore,  while  on  the  Atlantic 
side  the  drying  of  a  wide  strip  of  level  sea-bot- 
tom in  a  relatively  short  time  exterminated  a 
large  proportion  of  the  less  active  mollusks. 
And  in  this  instance  "  relatively  short  "  means 
positively  long ;  for,  compared  to  the  rise  of  a 
continent  from  the  ocean's  bed,  the  flow  of  a 
glacier  is  the  rapid  rush  of  a  mountain  torrent. 


228  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

Then,  too,  while  a  tendency  to  vary  seems  to 
be  inherent  in  animals,  some  appear  to  be  vastly 
more  susceptible  than  others  to  outside  influ- 
ences, to  respond  much  more  readily  to  any 
change  in  the  world  about  them.  In  fact,  Pro- 
fessor Cook  has  recently  suggested  that  the  in- 
born tendency  to  variation  is  sufficient  in  itself 
to  account  for  evolution,  this  tendency  being 
either  repressed  or  stimulated  as  external  con- 
ditions are  stable  or  variable. 

The  more  uniform  the  surrounding  condi- 
tions, and  the  simpler  the  animal,  the  smaller 
is  the  liability  to  change,  and  some  animals 
that  dwell  in  the  depths  of  the  ocean,  where 
light  and  temperature  vary  little,  if  any,  re- 
main at  a  standstill  for  long  periods  of  time. 

The  genus  Lingula,  a  small  shell,  traces  its 
ancestry  back  nearly  to  the  base  of  the  Ordo- 
vician  system  of  rocks,  an  almost  inconceivable 
lapse  of  time,  while  one  species  of  brachiopod 
shell  endures  unchanged  from  the  Trenton 
Limestone  to  the  Lower  Carboniferous.  In 
the  first  case  one  species  has  been  replaced  by 
another,  so  that  the  shell  of  to-day  is  not  ex 
actly  like  its  very  remote  ancestor,  but  that 


WHY   DO   ANIMALS   BECOME  EXTINCT?    22J> 

the  type  of  shell  should  have  remained  un- 
changed when  so  many  other  animals  have 
arisen,  flourished  for  a  time,  and  perished, 
means  that  there  was  slight  tendency  to  varia- 
tion,  and  that  the  surrounding  conditions  were 
uniform.  Says  Professor  Brooks,  speaking  of 
I  jingula:  "  The  everlasting  hills  are  the  type  of 
venerable  antiquity ;  but  Lingula  has  seen  the 
continents  grow  up,  and  lias  maintained  its  in- 
tegrity unmoved  by  the  convulsions  which 
have  given  the  crust  of  the  earth  its  present 
form." 

Many  instances  of  sudden  but  local  exter- 
mination might  be  adduced,  but  among  them 
that  of  the  tile-fish  is  perhaps  the  most  strik- 
ing. This  fish,  belonging  to  a  tropical  family 
having  its  headquarters  in  the  Gulf  of  Mexico, 
was  discovered  in  1879  in  moderately  deep 
water  to  the  southward  of  Massachusetts  and 
on  the  edge  of  the  Gulf  Stream,  where  it  was 
taken  in  considerable  numbers.  In  the  spring 
of  1 882  vessels  arriving  at  New  York  reported 
having  passed  through  great  numbers  of  dead 
and  dying  fishes,  the  water  being  thickly  dotted 
with  them  for  miles.  From  samples  brought 


230  ANIMALS  OF  THE   PAST 

in,  it  was  found  that  the  majority  of  these  were 
tile-fish,  while  from  the  reports  of  various  ves- 
sels it  was  shown  that  the  area  covered  by  dead 
fish  amounted  to  somewhere  between  5.000 
and  7,500  square  miles,  and  the  total  number 
of  dead  was  estimated  at  not  far  from  a  billion. 
This  enormous  and  widespread  destruction  is 
believed  to  have  been  caused  by  an  unwonted 
duration  of  northerly  and  easterly  winds,  which 
drove  the  cold  arctic  current  inshore  and  south- 
wards, chilling  the  warm  belt  hi  which  the  tile- 
fish  resided  and  killing  all  in  that  locality.  It 
was  thought  possible  that  the  entire  race  might 
have  been  destroyed,  but,  while  none  were 
taken  for  many  years,  in  1899  and  in  1900  a 
number  were  caught,  showing  that  the  species 
was  beginning  to  reoccupy  the  waters  from 
which  it  had  been  driven  years  before. 

The  effect  of  any  great  fall  in  temperature 
on  animals  specially  adapted  to  a  warm  climate 
is  also  illustrated  by  the  destruction  of  the 
Manatees  in  the  Sebastian  River,  Florida,  by 
the  winter  of  1894-95,  which  came  very  near 
exterminating  this  species.  Readers  may  re- 
member that  this  was  the  winter  that  wrought 


WHY   DO   ANIMALS   BECOME   EXTINCT?     231 

such  havoc  with  the  blue-birds,  while  in  the 
vicinity  of  Washington,  D.  C.,  the  fish-crows 
died  by  hundreds,  if  not  by  thousands. 

Fishes  may  also  be  exterminated  over  large 
areas  by  outbursts  of  poisonous  gases  from 
submarine  volcanoes,  or  more  rarely  by  some 
vast  lava  flood  pouring  into  the  sea  and  actually 
cooking  all  living  beings  in  the  vicinity.  And 
in  the  past  these  outbreaks  took  place  on  a 
much  larger  scale  than  now,  and  naturally 
wrought  more  widespread  destruction. 

A  recent  instance  of  local  extermination  is 
the  total  destruction  of  a  humming-bird,  Bel- 
lona  ornata,  peculiar  to  the  island  of  St.  Vin- 
cent, by  the  West  Indian  hurricane  of  1898, 
but  this  is  naturally  extirpation  on  a  very  small 
scale. 

Still,  the  problems  of  nature  are  so  involved 
that  while  local  destruction  is  ordinarily  of 
little  importance,  or  temporary  in  its  effects,  it 
may  lead  to  the  annihilation  of  a  species  by 
breaking  a  race  of  animals  into  isolated  groups, 
thereby  leading  to  inbreeding  and  slow  decline. 
The  European  bison,  now  confined  to  a  part  of 
Lithuania  and  a  portion  of  the  Caucasus,  seems 


232  ANIMALS   OF   THE    PAST 

to  be  slowly  but  surely  approaching  extinction 
in  spite  of  all  efforts  to  preserve  the  race,  and 
no  reason  can  be  assigned  for  this  save  that  the 
small  size  of  the  herds  has  led  to  in-breeding 
and  general  decadence. 

In  other  ways,  too,  local  calamity  may  be 
sweeping  in  its  effects,  and  that  is  by  the  de- 
struction of  animals  that  resort  to  one  spot  dur- 
ing the  breeding  season,  like  the  fur-seals  and 
some  sea-birds,  or  pass  the  winter  months  in 
great  flocks  or  herds,  as  do  the  ducks  and  elk. 
The  supposed  decimation  of  the  Moas  by  severe 
winters  has  been  already^discussed,  and  the 
extermination  of  the  great  auk  in  European 
waters  was  indirectly  due  to  natural  causes. 
These  birds  bred  on  the  small,  almost  inac- 
cessible island  of  Eldey,  off  the  coast  of  Ice- 
land, and  when,  through  volcanic  disturbances, 
this  islet  sank  into  the  sea,  the  few  birds  were 
forced  to  other  quarters,  and  as  these  were,  un- 
fortunately, easily  reached,  the  birds  were  slain 
to  the  last  one. 

From  the  great  local  abundance  of  their  re- 
mains, it  has  been  thought  that  the  curious 
short-legged  Pliocene  rhinoceros,  Aphclopsfos- 


WHY    DO    ANIMALS   BECOME   EXTINCT?     233 

siger,  was  killed  off  in  the  West  by  blizzards 
when  the  animals  were  gathered  in  their  win- 
ter quarters,  and  other  long-extinct  animals, 
too,  have  been  found  under  such  conditions  as 
to  suggest  a  similar  fate. 

Among  local  catastrophes  brought  about  by 
unusually  prolonged  cold  may  be  cited  the 
decimation  of  the  fur-seal  herds  of  the  Prib- 
ilof  Islands  in  1834  and  1859,  when  the  breed- 
ing seals  were  prevented  from  landing  by  the 
presence  of  ice-floes,  and  perished  by  thou- 
sands. Peculiar  interest  is  attached  to  this 
case,  because  the  restriction  of  the  northern 
fur-seals  to  a  few  isolated,  long  undiscovered 
islands,  is  believed  to  have  been  brought  about 
by  their  complete  extermination  in  other  lo- 
calities by  prehistoric  man.  Had  these  two 
seasons  killed  all  the  seals,  it  would  have  been 
a  reversal  of  the  customary  extermination  by 
man  of  a  species  reduced  in  numbers  by  nature. 

In  the  case  of  large  animals  another  element 
probably  played  a  part.  The  larger  the  ani- 
mal, the  fewer  young,  as  a  rule,  does  it  bring 
forth  at  a  birth,  the  longer  are  the  intervals 
between  births,  and  the  slower  the  growth  of 


234  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

the  young.  The  loss  of  two  or  three  broods 
of  sparrows  or  two  or  three  litters  of  rabbits 
makes  comparatively  little  difference,  as  the 
loss  is  soon  supplied,  but  the  death  of  the 
young  of  the  larger  and  higher  mammals  is  a 
more  serious  matter.  A  factor  that  has  prob- 
ably played  an  important  role  in  the  extinction 
of  animals  is  the  relation  that  exists  between 
various  animals,  and  the  relations  that  also 
exist  between  animals  and  plants,  so  that  the 
existence  of  one  is  dependent  on  that  of  an- 
other. Thus  no  group  of  living  beings,  plants 
or  animals,  can  be  affected  without  in  some 
way  affecting  others,  so  that  the  injury  or 
destruction  of  some  plant  may  result  in  seri- 
ous harm  to  some  animal.  Nearly  everyone  is 
familiar  with  the  classic  example  given  by  Dar- 
win of  the  effect  of  cats  on  the  growth  of  red 
clover.  This  plant  is  fertilized  by  bumble  bees 
only,  and  if  the  field  mice,  which  destroy  the 
nests  of  the  bees,  were  not  kept  in  check  by 
cats,  or  other  small  carnivores,  their  increase 
would  lessen  the  numbers  of  the  bees  and  this 
in  turn  would  cause  a  dearth  of  clover. 

The  yuccas  present  a  still  more  wonderful 


WHY    DO    ANIMALS    BECOME    EXTINCT?     235 

example  of  the  dependence  of  plants  on  ani- 
mals, for  their  existence  hangs  on  that  of  a 
small  moth  whose  peculiar  structure  and  hab- 
its bring  about  the  fertilization  of  the  flower. 
The  two  probably  developed  side  by  side  until 
their  present  state  of  inter-dependence  was 
reached,  when  the  extinction  of  the  one  would 
probably  bring  about  that  of  the  other. 

It  is  this  inter-dependence  of  living  things 
that  makes  the  outcome  of  any  direct  inter- 
ference with  the  natural  order  of  things  more 
or  less  problematical,  and  sometimes  brings 
about  results  quite  different  from  what  were 
expected  or  intended. 

The  gamekeepers  on  the  grouse  moors  of 
Scotland  systematically  killed  off  all  birds  of 
prey  because  they  caught  some  of  the  grouse, 
but  this  is  believed  to  have  caused  far  more 
harm  than  good  through  permitting  weak  and 
sickly  birds,  that  would  otherwise  have  fallen 
a  prey  to  hawks,  to  live  and  disseminate  the 
grouse  distemper. 

The  destruction  of  sheep  by  coyotes  led  the 
State  of  California  to  place  a  bounty  on  the 
heads  of  these  animals,  with  the  result  that  in 


236  ANIMALS    OF   THE    PAST 

eighteen  months  the  State  was  called  upon  to 
pay  out  $187,485.  As  a  result  of  the  war  on 
coyotes  the  animals  on  which  they  fed,  notably 
the  rabbits,  increased  so  enormously  that  in 
turn  a  bounty  was  put  on  rabbits,  the  damage 
these  animals  caused  the  fruit-growers  being 
greater  than  the  losses  among  sheep-owners 
from  the  depredations  of  coyotes.  And  so, 
says  Dr.  Palmer,  "In  this  remarkable  case 
of  legislation  a  large  bounty  was  offered  by  a 
county  in  the  interest  of  fruit-growers  to  coun- 
teract the  effects  of  a  State  bounty  expended 
mainly  for  the  benefit  of  sheep-owners  ! " 

Professor  Shaler,  in  noting  the  sudden  dis- 
appearance of  such  trees  as  the  gums,  magno- 
lias, and  tulip  poplars  from  the  Miocene  flora 
of  Europe  has  suggested  that  this  may  have 
been  due  to  the  attacks,  for  a  series  of  years, 
of  some  insect  enemy  like  the  gipsy  moth,  and 
the  theory  is  worth  considering,  although  it 
must  be  looked  upon  as  a  possibility  rather 
than  a  probability.  Still,  anyone  familiar  with 
the  ravages  of  the  gipsy  moth  in  Massachu- 
setts, where  the  insect  was  introduced  by  ac- 
cident, can  readily  imagine  what  might  have 


WHY    DO   ANIMALS   BECOME   EXTINCT?     237 

been  the  effect  of  some  sudden  increase  in  the 
numbers  of  such  a  pest  on  the  forests  of  the 
past.  Trees  might  resist  the  attacks  of  ene- 
mies and  the  destruction  of  their  leaves  for 
two  or  three  years,  but  would  be  destroyed  by 
a  few  additional  seasons  of  defoliation. 

Ordinarily  the  abnormal  increase  of  any  in- 
sect is  promptly  followed  by  an  increase  in  the 
number  of  its  enemies  ;  the  pest  is  killed  off, 
the  destroyers  die  of  starvation  and  nature's 
balance  is  struck.  But  if  by  some  accident, 
such  as  two  or  three  consecutive  seasons  of 
wet,  drought,  or  cold,  the  natural  increase  of 
the  enemies  was  checked,  the  balance  of  nature 
would  be  temporarily  destroyed  and  serious 
harm  done.  That  such  accidents  may  occur 
is  familiar  to  us  by  the  damage  wrought  in 
Florida  and  other  Southern  States  by  the  un- 
wonted severity  of  the  winters  of  1893,  1895, 
and  1899. 

If  any  group  of  forest  trees  was  destroyed  in 
the  manner  suggested  by  Professor  Shaler,  the 
effects  would  be  felt  by  various  plants  and  ani- 
mals. In  the  first  place,  the  insects  that  fed 
on  these  trees  would  be  forced  to  seek  another 


238  ANIMALS   OF   THE   PAST 

source  of  food  and  would  be  brought  into  a 
silent  struggle  with  forms  already  in  posses- 
sion, while  the  destruction  of  one  set  of  plants 
would  be  to  the  advantage  of  those  with  which 
they  came  into  competition  and  to  the  disad- 
vantage of  vegetation  that  was  protected  by 
the  shade.  Finally,  these  changed  conditions 
would  react  in  various  ways  on  the  smaller 
birds  and  mammals,  the  general  effect  being, 
to  use  a  well-worn  simile,  like  that  of  casting 
a  stone  into  a  quiet  pool  and  setting  in  motion 
ripples  that  sooner  or  later  reach  to  every  part 
of  the  margin. 

It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  warn  the  reader 
that  for  the  most  part  this  is  purely  conjectu- 
ral, for  from  the  nature  of  the  case  it  is  bound 
to  be  so.  But  it  is  one  of  the  characteristics 
of  educated  man  that  he  wishes  to  know  the 
why  and  wherefore  of  everything,  and  is  in  a 
condition  of  mental  unhappiness  until  he  has 
at  least  formulated  some  theory  which  seems 
to  harmonize  with  the  visible  facts.  And 
from  the  few  glimpses  we  get  of  the  extinction 
of  animals  from  natural  causes  we  must  formu- 
late a  theory  to*  fit  the  continued  extermina- 


WHY   DO   ANIMALS   BECOME.  EXTINCT?     239 

tion  that  has  been  taking  place  ever  since  liv- 
ing beings  came  into  the  world  and  were  pitted 
against  one  another  and  against  their  sur- 
roundings in  the  silent  and  ceaseless  struggle 
for  existence. 


THE    END. 


INDEX 


INDEX 

The  asterisk  denotes  tliat  the  animal  or  object  is  figured 
on  or  opposite  the  page  referred  to. 

^Epyornis,  egg  of,  145,  148,*  147,  157 

eggs  found  in  swamps,  148 ;  found  floating,  148 

eggs  used  for  bowls,  145 

origin  of  fable  of  Roc,  144,  145 
Alaskan  Live  Mammoth  Story,  190-193,  197 
Anomoepus  tracks,  39 
Apteryx  egg,  147 
Archseopteryx,  description  of,  77,  78 

discovery  of,  77 

earliest  known  bird,  70 

restoration,  89* 

specimens  of,  70,*  88 

wing,  72,*  73 
Archelon,  a  great  turtle,  54 

» 
Basilosaurus,  60 

See  also  Zeuglodon 
Beehler,  L.  W.,  209,  213 
Birds,  always  clad  in  feathers,  71,  127 
earliest,  70 

243 


244  INDEX 

Birds,  first  intimation  of,  76 

rarity  of  fossil,  86,  87 

related  to  reptiles,  92 

wings  of  embryonic,  73 

with  teeth,  79,  88 
Bison,  European,  231 
Books  of  reference,  xix,  17,  32,  47,  69,  89,  110,  137, 

158,  176,  197,  218 
Breeding  of  large  animals,  233 
Brontomis,  size  of  leg- bones,  149 
Brontosaurus,  size  of  bopes,  96,*  97,*  109 
Brooks,  W.  K.,  on  Lingula,  229 
Buffalo  legend,  216 
Buttons  as  vestigial  structures,  202 

Carcharodon  auriculatus,  66 

teeth,  66 

megalodon,  65 

estimated  size,  66 

teeth,  65,  67 

Carson  City  footprints,  45 
Casts,  how  formed,  10,  11 
Cats  and  clover,  234 
Cephalaspis,  24*« 
Ceratosaurus,  habits,  106 

restoration,  106* 

skull,  110* 

Changes  in  Nature  slow,  227 
Cheirotherium,  43 


INDEX  245 

Chlamydosaums,  129 

Claosaurus.     See  Thespesius 

Climate,  changes  in  western  United  States,  174 

Clover  and  cats,  234 

Cold,  effects  of,  on  animals,  230,  231,  233 

Cold  winters,  230 

Collecting  fossils,  17,  112-116 

Color  of  large  land  animals,  134 

of  young  animals,  136 
Covering  of  extinct  animals  sometimes  indicated,  131, 

132 
Coyotes,  effect  of  their  destruction  on  fruit,  236 

Dall,   W.    H.,   theory  as  to   extinction   of  mollusks, 

227 
Dinosaurs,  bones  of,  109,  110 

brain  of,  93 

collections  of,  109 

compared  to  marsupials,  95 

first  discovered,  90 

food  required  by,  98 

hip-bones  mistaken  for  shoulder-blade,  120 

Professor  Marsh's  epitaph  for,  222 

range,  92 

recognized  as  new  order  of  reptiles,  91 

related  to  ostrich  and  alligator,  91 

size  of,  95,  96,  98 

tracks,  ascribed  to  birds,  38 
Dinotherium,  200 


246  INDEX 

Diplodocus,  estimated  weight,  99 
supposed  habits,  99 

Egg  of  jEpyornis,  147,  148;  Apteryx,  147;  Ostrich, 

146;  Moa,  148 
Eggs,  casts  of,  87 
Elephant,  size,  180 

size- of  tusks,  181,  182 
Elephas  ganesa,  tusks,  196 
Encrustations,  14 
Extermination.     See  Extinction 
Extinction,  ascribed  to  great  convulsions,  225 

ascribed  to  primitive  man,  188,  224 

of  Dinosaurs,  221 

local,  225 

by  man,  224,  225 

of  Marine  Reptiles,  222 

often  unaccountable,  222,  223 

of  Pliocene  rhinoceros,  232 

sometimes  evolution,  221,  226 

of  Titanotheres,  222 

Feathers,  imprints  of,  76,  132 
Fishes,  abundance  of,  25 

armored,  23,  24,  25,  28 

collections  of,  32 

killed  by  cold,  230 

killed  by  volcanoes,  231 
Fish-crows,  killed  by  cold,  231 
Flesh  does  not  petrify,  10 


INDEX  247 

Flightless  birds,  absent  from  Tasmania,  155 

present  distribution,  154,  155 

relation  between  flightlessness  and  size,  156 
Folds  and  frills,  129 
Footprints,  collections  of,  47 

books  on,  47 

See  also  under  Tracks 
FossiHbitds,  rarity  of,  86 
Fossil  man,  13 

Fossilization  a  slow  process,  10 
Fossils,  conditions  under  which  they  are  formed,  5,  7 

coUecting,  112-116 

definition  of,  1 

deformation  of,  16 

impressions,  2,  3 

not  necessarily  petrifactions,  2 

preparation  of,  117-119 

why  they  are  not  more  common,  5,  15,  16 
Fowls,  muscles  of,  81 
Frill  of  Triceratops,  102 
Fur-seals  killed  by  ice-floes,  233 

Gar  pikes,  destruction  of,  26 

Giant  birds,  reasons  for  distribution  and  flightlessness, 

153       . 
Giant  Moa,  141 

leg  compared  with  that  of  horse,  152* 
Giant  Sloth,  domesticated  by  man,  224 

struggle  between,  46 


248  INDEX 

Giant  Sloth,  tracks  at  Carson  City,  46 
Gilfort,  Robert,  157 
Great  Auk,  extermination  of,  232 
Grouse  on  Scotch  moors,  235 

Hawkins,  B.  W.,  restorations  by,  137 
Hesperornis,  description  of,  80 
impressions  of  feathers,  132 
position  of  legs,  83,  84 
restoration  of,  82* 
Hippotherium,  166,  167 
Hoactzin,  habits  of,  74,  15*/ 
Horn  does  not  petrify,  130 
Horse,  abundant  in  Pleistocene  time,  164 

books  on,  176 

of  bronze  age,  163,  167 

collections  of  fossil,  176 

development  of,  167,  168,*  175 

differences  between  fossil  and  living,  163 

early  domestication,  165 

evidence  as  to  genealogy,  170-173 

extra-toed,  172,  173 

found  in  South  America  in  1530,  165 

of  Julius  Caesar,  172 

none  found  wild  in  historic  times,  165 

Pliocene,  166 

possibility  of  existence  in  America  up  to  the  time 
of  its  discovery,  169,  170 

primitive,  160,  161* 


INDEX  249 

Horse,  sketched  by  primitive  man,  163 

teeth  of,  170 

three-toed,  166 

Humming-bird,  exterminated  by  hurricane,  231 
Hydrarchus,  62* 
Hyracotherium,  160,  161,*  170,  174 

Ichthyosaurs,  silhouettes  of,  132 
Iguanodons,  found  at  Bernissart,  104 
Impressions  of  feathers,  131 

of  scales,  131 

of  skin,  131 

Inbreeding,  effects  of,  231,  232 
Information,  sources  of,  xvi 
Innuits,  habits,  192 

Interdependence  of  animals  and  plants,  234,  235,  238 
Ivory,  fossil,  2,  4,  188,  189 

Jaw  of  Mosasaur,  54* 
of  reptiles,  53 

Killing  of  the  Mammoth,  story,  177,  193 
Kimmswick,  deposit  of  Mastodon  bones,  209 
Knight,  Charles  R.,  restorations  by,  xviii,  136 
Koch's  Hydrarchus,  61,  62* 
Missourium,  207,*  208 

Leaves,  impressions  of,  3,  13 
Leg  of  Brontornis,  149* 


250  INDEX 

Leg  of  the  Great  Brontosaurus,  96* 

of  Giant  Moa,  152* 

position  in  Hesperornis,  83 

position  in  ducks,  84 
Lenape  Stone,  215,  216,  219* 
Life,  earliest  traces  of,  21,  34 
Lingula,  antiquity  of,  228 

Professor  Brooks  on,  229 
Loricaria,  24* 

Mammoth,  adapted  to  a  cold  climate,  134 
Alaskan  Live,  Story,  190 
believed  to  live  underground,  178 
bones  taken  for  those  of  giants,  185 
contemporary  with  man,  189 
derivation  of  name,  178 
description,  179  -• 

discovery  of  entire  specimens,  183,  187 
distribution,  184,  186 
drawn  by  early  man,  189,  197* 
entire  specimens  obtainable,  194 
reasons  for  extermination,  188 
killing  of  the,  177 
literature  on,  197 
misconception  as  to  size,  179 
mounted  skeleton,  179 
not  now  living,  190 
preservation  of  remains,  187 
skeletons  in  Alaska,  181,  195 


INDEX  251 

Mammoth,  in  Chicago  Academy  of  Sciences,  179 

at  St.  Petersburg,  183* 

restoration,  176  * 

size,  179,  180,  181 

size  of  tusks,  181,  196 

teeth,  196,  199* 

teeth  dredged  in  North  Sea,  184 

tusks  brought  into  market,  188,  189 
Man  contemporary  with  Mammoth,  189 

fossil,  13 

of  Guadeloupe,  13 
Manatees  killed  by  cold,  230 
Marsh,  Prof.  O.  C.,  collection  of  fossil  horses,  176 

on  Dinosaurs,  222 

on  toothed  birds,  79,  89 
Mastodon,  bones  taken  for  those  of  giants,  205 

thought  to  be  carnivorous,  206 

covering,  210 

description,  210 

distribution,  203,  210,  212 

extinction,  212 

literature,  218 

and  man,  215,  216 

first  noticed  in  America,  204 

origin  unknown,  202 

remains  abundant,  208,  209 

remains  in  Ulster  and  Orange  counties,  New  York, 
204,  206 

restoration,  210* 


252  INDEX 

Mastodon,  size,  211 

skeletons  on  exhibition,  218 

species,  203 

teeth,  198,  199,*  218 

tusks,  199,  200 
Mesohippus,  167 
Mimicry,  not  conscious,  128 
Missourium  of  Koch,  207,*  208 
Moas,  collections  of,  156,  157 

contemporary  with  man,  143,  144 

deductions  from  distribution,  143 

destruction  of,  143,  144 

discovery  of  bones,  140 

elephant-footed,  142 

feathers  of,  141 

Giant,  141 

supposed  food  of,  142 

legends  of,  139,  140 

literature,  158 

scientific  names,  146 

size  of,  141 

species  of,  141 

Moloch,  an  Australian  lizard,  1 00  * 
Mosasaurs,  abundance  of,  in  Kansas,  52 

books  on,  69 

collections  of,  68 

extinction  of,  56 

first  discovery,  50 

jaw  of,  54  * 


INDEX  253 

Mosasaurs,  range  of,  49 

restoration,  52  * 

size  of,  49,  50 
Mylodon  tracks  at  Carson  City,  45 

Names,  scientific,  reasons  for  using,  xvi,  xvii 
Nature,  balance  of,  238 
Nuts,  fossil,  11 

Oldest  animals,  21 

vertebrates,  19,  22 
Ostrich  egg,  147 
Over-specialization,  221,  222 

Peale,  C.  W.,  205 

Peale,  Rembrandt,  205,  206 

Pelican,  mandible,  53 

Penguins,  depend  on  fat  for  warmth,  127 

feathers  highly  modified,  128 

swim  with  wings,  80 
Petrified  bodies,  10 
Phororhacos,  description  of,  149 

mistaken  for  mammal,  149 

Patagonian  bird,  148 

related  to  heron  family,  152 

restoration,  frontispiece 

skull,  150,  151  * 
Protohippus,  166 
Pteraspis,  28 


254  INDEX 

Pterichthys,  25,  28,  32  * 

mistaken  for  crab,  25 
Pterodactyls,  impressions  of  wings,  133 

from  Kansas,  55 

wing,  72  * 
Py craft,  W.  P.,  restoration  of  Archaeopteryx,  89 

Radiolarians,  15,  17* 

Reconstruction  of  animals,  127,  130,  134 

Reptiles,  fasting  powers  of,  98 

growth  throughout  life,  102 

jaws,  53 
Restorations,  xviii 

Archaeopteryx,  89  * 

Ceratosaurus,  106  * 

Hesperornis,  82  * 

Mammoth,  176  * 

Mastodon,  210  * 

Phororhacos,  frontispiece 

progress  in,  137 

Stegosaums,  108  * 

Thespesius,  90  * 

Triceratops,  126  * 

Tylosaurus,  52  * 
Reversion  of  fancy  stock,  171 
Rhinoceros,  exterminated  by  cold,  232 
Roc,  legend  of,  144,  145 
Rocks,  thickness  of  sedimentary,  20 
Ruffles  on  dresses,  202 


INDEX  255 

Schuchert,  Charles,  on  collecting  fossils,  17 

collector  of  Zeuglodon  bones,  63 
Seals,  covering  of,  128 
Sea-serpent,  belief  in,  56 

possibility  of  existence,  57 
Shaler,   Professor,    on    changes    in    Miocene    flora   of 

Europe,  236,  237 
Sharks,  early,  31 

Great-toothed,  65 

known  from  spines  and  teeth,  29 

Port  Jackson,  29 

teeth  of,  69 

White,  or  Man-Eater,  65 
Skeleton,  basis  of  all  restorations,  127 

best  testimony  of  animate  relationships,  124 

information  to  be  derived  from,  120,  122,  123, 

124,  125,  126,  127 

a  problem  in  mechanics,  102,  124 

reconstruction  of,  120 

relation  of,  to  exterior  of  animal,  121,  127 

of  Triceratops,  103,*  121 
Spines  and  plates,  130 
Stegosaurus,  description  of,  106 

restoration  of,  108* 
Survival  of  the  fittest,  173 

Teeth,  birds  with,  79 

of  gnawing  animals,  169,  200 
of  grass-eaters,  169 


256  INDEX 

Teeth,  of  horse,  170 

of  mammoth,  198,  199* 

of  mastodon,  198,  199* 

of  sharks,  29,  30 

of  Thespesius,  105 
Thespesius,  abundance  of,  104,  105 

brain  of,  93 

(Same  as  Claosaurus) 

engulfed  in  quicksand,  8 

impressions  of  skin,  132 

restoration  of,  90* 

teeth  of,  105 

at  Yale,  109 

Tiger,  preying  on  reindeer,  134 
Tile-fish,  destruction  of,  230 
Titanichthys,  28,  29 
Toothed  birds,  collections  of,  88 

discovery  of,  79 
Townsend  C.  H.,  190-192 
Tracks,  ascribed  to  birds,  38 

ascribed  to  giants,  45 

animals  known  from,  41 

collections  of,  47 

of  Connecticut  Valley,  37 

deductions  from,  44 

of  Dinosaurs,  38,*  40,*  41,  47* 

discovery  in  England  and  America,  37,  42 

how  formed,  35,  40 

at  Hastings,  44 


INDEX  257 

Tracks,  of  Mylodon,  46 

of  worms,  3,  33 
Triceratops,  brain,  94 

broken  horn,  102 

description,  100,  101 

restoration,  126* 

skeleton,  103* 
Tufa,  14 
Tukeman,  killing  of  the  Mammoth,  177,  193 

Variation  in  animals,  228 
Vertebrates,  oldest,  22 
Vestigial  structures,  201,  202 
Volcanic  outbursts,  231,  232 

Webster,  F.  S.,  on  destruction  of  gar  pikes,  26 
White,  C.  A.,  on  the  nature  and  uses  of  fossils,  17 
White  Shark,  65 
Wings,  71,  72,*  73 

of  embryonic  birds,  73 
Wood,  fossil,  9,  10 
Worm  trails,  3,  33 

Yucca,  fertilization,  235 

Zeuglodon,  abundance  of  remains,  60 
same  as  Basilosaurus 
description,  58,  63 
habits,  59 


258  INDEX 

Zeuglodon,  Koch's  restoration,  62 
name,  58,  69 
once  numerous,  60 
size,  58 

specimen  of,  68 
structure  of  bones,  64 
teeth,  58,  69* 


9414 


This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below 

MAY  1  0  1954 


Form  L-9-15m-7,'32 


LOGY 

"f  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES.  CALIF 


765 


Lucas  - 


cop.  2 

Animals  of  the 

past. 


